UPDATE: On September 24, the Georgia Supreme Court heard the case on whether independent presidential candidates need petitions from each candidate for presidential elector. If so, the petitions for Claudia De la Cruz and Cornel West are invalid, even though both candidates followed the advice of the Secretary of State. West v Wittenstein, S25A0178.

The oral argument went badly for the two candidates, but there is no decision yet. An earlier version of this post erroneously said the two candidates had already lost.

Some Georgia ballots have already been printed with those presidential candidates’ names on the ballot.

In the past, independent presidential candidates did petition for themselves in Georgia, and their presidential elector candidates did not petition. But the law was re-worded in 2017. The law is very murky but the plaintiff parties could not point to past practice in Georgia, because the new law is different from the old law.

The last states that required individual candidates for presidential elector to submit their own petitions were Minnesota and Wisconsin, but both states reformed their process over 70 years ago.

On September 23, Liz Cheney, speaking on the Rachel Maddow show, said a new political party may be needed in the U.S. See this story. Thanks to Brian Hauptli for the link.

The Oregon Working Families Party is running its own member for State Treasurer, Mary King. See her website here.

It is very unusual for the Working Families Party to nominate its own members for statewide office in any state. The Working Families Parties of New York, Connecticut, and South Carolina never failed to cross-nominate the Democratic nominee, for all statewide offices.

The Oregon Green Party has also nominated King.