The North Carolina ballot access bill, HB 32, still has a chance to pass the legislature. The session had been expected to end on June 19, but now the new expected date of adjournment is July 2. The bill passed the House last year, and also passed the Senate Rules Committee last year. It reduces the number of signatures needed for newly-qualifying parties and independent candidates. Currently North Carolina requires more signatures for statewide office than any other state except California.
It has been over two years since the South Carolina Republican Party filed a federal lawsuit over whether the party can limit its primary to voters who identify with the party. The case is Greenville County Republican Party v State of South Carolina, 6:10-cv-1407. The case is far from being decided.
Back on August 2, 2011, a scheduling order provided that all briefs and discovery ought to be finished by June 15, 2012. But since then, the scheduling order has been revised several times. Currently, briefs and discovery are due by December 2012 and a trial is expected in January 2013.
Current law provides for an open primary for all parties that hold primaries. The Republican Party wants to exclude voters who are not sympathetic to the Republican Party.
T. J. O’Hara, a businessman from San Diego County, California, received the fifth highest number of clicks in the Americans Elect nomination process. He has this article in the Washington Times, providing an account of how the Americans Elect web page and voting system was flawed.
O’Hara received 584 clicks. The candidates who received more clicks were Buddy Roemer with 6,293; Rocky Anderson with 3,390; Michealene Risley with 2,351; and Laurence Kotlikoff with 2,027.
The Egyptian presidential run-off was held June 16-17, but the results still aren’t out, and they won’t be for several days. See this news story.
This contrasts with the vote tallies in the May initial presidential election, when the results were released quite soon after the polls closed.
The Knoxville News Sentinel has reported that the Green Party is running two candidates for the state house in the Knoxville area, and that they will be the only opponents in the general election to the incumbents. See this story, from a television station’s web page, which refers to the newspaper story.
The Secretary of State’s web page refuses to list any Green Party or Constitution Party nominees for the November election, so far. The state is hoping to persuade the 6th circuit to remove those two parties and their nominees from the ballot. The 6th circuit has said it will not act on the state’s request until at or after the hearing on July 25. In the meantime, the parties and their candidates are on the ballot, and it seems petty for the Secretary of State to refuse to list the candidates.
