On February 21, California Assemblymember Richard Gordon introduced AB 2351, to ease the definition of “political party” to a group that has registration membership of one-third of 1% of the state total. That would be approximately 60,000 registered members. Existing law requires registration of 1% of the last gubernatorial vote, which is currently 103,004, but which will probably rise to approximately 110,000 in November 2014. Thanks to C. T. Weber for this news. UPDATE: here is a link to the text of the bill.

The existing law also says a qualified party is one that polled 2% of the vote for any statewide race in the last midterm election, and that is the provision in the existing law that generally is used to keep minor parties on the ballot. But that part of the law doesn’t work any longer, because minor party statewide candidates realistically can’t hope to appear on the November ballot any longer, because of Proposition 14, the top-two system. Another part of AB 2351 moves the 2% vote test from the general election to the primary election.

On February 20, the Arizona State Senate passed HB 2196, so the bill is now through the legislature and on its way to the Governor. The bill repeals the 2013 omnibus election law bill. One of the provisions of that 2013 law made it extremely difficult for minor party members to get on their own party’s primary ballot, and literally impossible for minor parties to nominate candidates in their own primary by write-in vote. Thanks to Rick Hasen for this news.

Brian Kemp, the Secretary of State of Georgia, and a Republican, wants as many southern states as possible to hold their presidential primaries in early March in 2016. See this report from Frontloading HQ.