On March 13, the Missouri House passed HB 1902, which moves the presidential primary from February to March. Thanks to FrontloadingHQ for this news.
Reply
On March 13, the Kansas Senate Ethics & Elections Committee passed HB 2130. It is an omnibus election law bill, and among other things, repeals the ban on out-of-state circulators. The bill had passed the House last year. Kansas has two-year legislative sessions.
On March 12, Kentucky SB 205 passed the Senate State & Local Government Committee. It allows people who are running for President or Vice-President to run for another office simultaneously. Thanks to Political Wire for this news.
Louisiana election law allows use of the label “independent” on the ballot for independent presidential candidates, but not independent candidates for other office. However, Representative Jerome Richard has introduced HB 193, to allow “independent” as a ballot label for all independent candidates, not just presidential independents. Current law requires them to use “No party” as a ballot label.
Governor Bobby Jindal vetoed a similar law in 2011, but the Governor’s veto message showed confusion. His veto message said that the bill wasn’t necessary because another law already prevents a party from being named “Independent Party.” But whether a qualified political party can call itself the Independent Party is not the same subject as whether independent candidates can use that label.
The Rhodes Cook Letter is a print publication that is published every two months. Every issue has analysis of U.S. elections. The editor is Rhodes Cook, who also authors America Votes, the books that appear every two years and contain accurate and complete election returns for president, congress, and gubernatorial elections. The books include both primaries and general elections.
The February 2014 Rhodes Cook Letter has a survey of congressional incumbents who have been defeated for re-election in the years 2000 through 2012. It finds 209 incumbents were defeated during those years. Of those 209, 167 were defeated in the general election and only 42 (20%) were defeated in a primary.
The Independent Voters Network (based in California) and Independent Voting (based in New York) both engage in activism against closed primaries. Both organizations frequently say that primary elections are far more important than general elections, and sometimes they even allege that 95% of all elections are decided in the primaries, not the general elections. However, neither organization, to date, has presented any statistical evidence for those claims.