Among the states that are holding regular elections for state legislature this year, Illinois is the only state with no minor party or independent candidates on the ballot for any legislative race.
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On Sunday, September 13, the New Mexico Forward Party filed this reply brief in New Mexico Forward Party v Tpulouse Oliver, 26-2145. The issue is the New Mexico election law that requires a new party to file a petition to become qualified, but then (after the party nominates by convention) the law also requires each nominee of the new party to file his or her own separate petition.
The Forward Party complied with the first petition, but for its two statewide nominees, it was unable to collect the needed 14,246 that each needed on separate petitions. The party seeks injunctive relief to put its two statewide nominees on the ballot. If no injunction is received, New Mexico will be one of eight states this year in which all the statewide offices have only the Democratic and Republican nominees on the ballot. The other states are Alabama, California, Connecticut, Georgia, Louisiana, New York, and Virginia (two states, Utah and Washington, have no statewide offices up this year).
This year the South Carolina Democratic Party has a nominee for all 124 state legislative seats that are up this year, the first time since 1990 that the South Carolina Democratic Party has done that.
The South Carolina Senate is not up in midterm years. Only the 124 State House seats are up.
This year, Rhode Island elects all 38 State Senators and all 75 State Representatives. Out of those 113 legislative races, the Republican Party only has nominees in 29.
There are no minor party nominees for Rhode Island legislature this year. There weren’t any in 2024 either.
On August 26, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ruled that Chris Gambino should remain on the ballot as the Forward Party’s nominee for State Representative, 143rd district. See this story. Democrats had challenged his ballot position on the grounds that his ballot label, “Forward Independent”, is illegal. The Democratic challengers said that Gambino could not use that label because other candidates in other districts were on the ballot as “independent”, and therefore “independent” was reserved for those candidates.
The challengers have appealed to the State Supreme Court. See this story. Apparently the appeal is on whether Gambino had enough valid signatures.
This is believed to be the first instance at which Democrats have challenged the ballot access of any Forward Party nominee, anywhere in the nation. One wonders why Democrats feel that a Forward Party nominee on the ballot necessarily hurts the Democratic nominee.