Seven West Virginia Republican Delegates have introduced HB 2608. It requires independent candidates to file a declaration of candidacy by the second Monday in January of an election year. The sponsors are Rick Hillenbrand, Bill Ridenour, Charles Sheedy, Eric Brooks, Joe Funkhouser, Lisa White, and Margitta Mozzoocchi.

A similar West Virginia law was struck down in 2016 in Daly v Tennant, 216 F Supp 3d 699 (s.d.). The state did not appeal. Also, the Fourth Circuit struck down a similar South Carolina in 1990, in Cromer v State, 917 F 2d 810, and West Virginia is in the Fourth Circuit. Thanks to Jeff Becker for news about the bill.

Blake Sasha, an activist with Voter Choice Arizona, has this op-ed in Arizona Capitol Times, criticizing top-two systems because they sharply limit voter choices in general elections. Sasha is a supporter of top-five systems, and a Republican.

Iowa Representative Derek Wulf (R-Hudson) has introduced HF 353. It bars candidates from primaries if they have been members of another party during the preceding year. Here is the text. It also bars voters from voting in primaries if they have been members of another party during the preceding thirty days, and it attempts to extend this rule to party caucuses.

In 1986 the U.S. Supreme Court decision Tashjian v Republican Party of Connecticut said that if parties wish to nominate a non-member, the First Amendment freedom of association clause protects their ability to do that. Courts in Colorado and New Mexico have struck down duration of party membership laws, in situations in which the party didn’t want the restriction.