Illinois Green Party Asks State Supreme Court to Preserve its Qualified Status in Some Districts

Posted on by December 26, 2011
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On December 23, the Illinois Green Party asked the State Supreme Court to hear its appeal in Illinois Green Party v Illinois State Board of Elections. This is the case over the interpretation of the state’s definition of “political party.” The election law says that group that is not a qualified party statewide is still a qualified party within any district or local jurisdiction, if that group got 5% of the vote within that area in the last election.

The Green Party polled over 5% if the vote in November 2010 in four U.S. House districts, and six State House districts. But, the state won’t recognize that the Green Party is still ballot-qualified, because the district boundaries changed this year. On December 22, the State Appeals Court refused any relief to the Green Party, except that it did authorize an expedited appeal to the State Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Green Party member Laurel Lambert Schmidt submitted 1,315 signatures to be on the Green Party primary ballot in the 3rd U.S. House district. If the State Supreme Court rules that the Green Party is still entitled to its own primary in that district, she will appear unopposed on the Green primary ballot. But if the State Supreme Court rules against the party, there will be no primary and all those signatures will have been gathered in vain.

If the Green Party is deemed not to have ballot status in any U.S. House district, it could then submit 5,000 signatures in any district by June 2012, the same as the procedure for any other unqualified party that wants to have a nominee in November for that office.

Donald Trump Ran For President in 2000 in Several Reform Party Presidential Primaries

Posted on by December 25, 2011
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Recently, Donald Trump has been suggesting that he might run for president outside the two major parties in 2012. He has talked about running as an independent, and also said he might seek the Americans Elect nomination.

This is not the first time he has showed interest in running for President outside the two major parties. In 2000 he ran in a few Reform Party presidential primaries. He won the California Reform Party presidential primary, polling 15,311 votes; others who ran in that primary were George Weber with 9,390 votes; Robert Bowman, 4,879; John B. Anderson, 3,158; and Charles Collins, 1,837.

Trump ran in the 2000 Michigan Reform primary, polling 2,120 votes, defeating an uncommitted slate which got 630 votes. A slate of delegates pledged to him submitted a petition in the New York Independence Party presidential primary, but it was removed from the ballot on the technicality that he himself had not submitted the petition.

Trump could have run in the Missouri Reform primary in 2000, but he did not file there, and Pat Buchanan won that primary.

Virginia 2011 Independent Candidate for Legislature has Big Impact on 2012 Presidential Primary

Posted on by December 25, 2011
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There are currently many news stories and blog discussions about the Virginia presidential primary ballot access law. Some large blogs, such as Red State, have over 300 comments about the story. Some defend the current Virginia ballot access laws on the grounds that in past presidential elections, a fairly large number of Republican presidential primary candidates managed to qualify.

But what has not been reported is that in the only other presidential primaries in which Virginia required 10,000 signatures (2000, 2004, and 2008) the signatures were not checked. Any candidate who submitted at least 10,000 raw signatures, on notarized sheets, and which had at least 400 signatures from each U.S. House district, was put on the ballot. In 2000, five Republicans qualified: George Bush, John McCain, Alan Keyes, Gary Bauer, and Steve Forbes. In 2004 there was no Republican primary in Virginia. In 2008, six Republicans qualified: John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, and Fred Thompson (an earlier version of this post erroneously said Alan Keyes qualified in 2008, but he only qualified in 2000).

The only reason the Virginia Republican Party checked the signatures for validity for the current primary is that in October 2011, an independent candidate for the legislature, Michael Osborne, sued the Virginia Republican Party because it did not check petitions for its own members, when they submitted primary petitions. Osborne had no trouble getting the needed 125 valid signatures for his own independent candidacy, but he charged that his Republican opponent’s primary petition had never been checked, and that if it had been, that opponent would not have qualified. The lawsuit, Osborne v Boyles, cl 11-520-00, was filed in Bristol County Circuit Court. It was filed too late to be heard before the election, but is still pending. The effect of the lawsuit was to persuade the Republican Party to start checking petitions. If the Republican Party had not changed that policy, Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry would be on the 2012 ballot.

The Democratic Party of Virginia has been opposed to the strict law on primary ballot access, and has been in the habit of collecting signatures for all Democratic presidential candidates recognized by the party. In 2008, the state party collected 7,300 signatures for all its candidates, thus easing the burden on them and requiring them to collect only 4,000 to 5,000 on their own.

Newt Gingrich, Quite Properly, Criticizes Virginia Ballot Access Laws

Posted on by December 24, 2011
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On December 24, Newt Gingrich criticized Virginia’s ballot access law for presidential primary candidates. See this story. The Gingrich campaign initially seemed to believe that Gingrich could launch a write-in campaign, but Virginia election law bans write-ins in primaries, although the Virginia Constitution protects write-ins in general elections.

Gingrich could plausibly sue Virginia over its requirement that circulators cannot work in Virginia unless they live in Virginia. Lawsuits against residency requirements for circulators have won in Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Some of these victories were against bans on out-of-state circulators, and some of them were against bans on out-of-district circulators.

Also on December 24, Professor Rick Hasen, an election law expert, commented that when a state ballot access law bars a majority of the leading contenders from the ballot, something is wrong with the law. The Republican Party now generally recognizes seven contenders for its nomination, and in Virginia, only two of them qualified.