The Vermont Progressive Party, which has repeatedly won the partisan election for Mayor of Burlington (the largest city in the state) will not contest the March 2012 mayoral election. See this story.
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Texas has a unique law, requiring that any group that intends to petition for party status must notify the state no later than January 2 of an election year. This year, ten groups filed the notice, more than ever before. The requirement has existed since 1993, has never been tested in court, and would probably be held unconstitutional if a new party formed after January 2 ever challenged it in court.
The ten groups that filed the notice are described in this Politex story. The ten are Americans Elect, Christian, Constitution, Generation, Justice, Make America Great, Reform, Revive America, Socialist, and Texas Independent Party. The Christian and Generation Parties have recently said that they don’t really expect to petition in 2012, although because they filed the notice, they are legally free to do so. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.
On November 8, 2011, Gabriela Mosquera, the Democratic nominee for Assembly, 4th district, was elected to the legislature with a margin of 20,000 votes. A month later, her Republican opponent charged that Mosquera had not lived in the district for a full year. She was short 50 days.
On January 5, a lower state court in Camden blocked Mosquera from taking the oath of office. On January 27, the New Jersey Supreme Court will hear the case. It is conceivable the State Supreme Court will rule the one-year duration of residency requirement within the district violates the U.S. Constitution. Or it is conceivable that the court will find another resolution. See this story. The Fourth District is in Camden and Gloucester Counties.
This Richmond Times-Dispatch story mentions that the Virginia State Board of Elections has complied with the Republican Party’s request to drop the loyalty oath for voters. The party had originally required all voters to pledge to vote for the Republican nominee in November, as a condition of receiving a ballot on March 6. As the story mentions, Newt Gingrich is a resident of Virginia, and he has already said that if Ron Paul becomes the Republican nominee, he will not vote for Paul. So, Newt would not have been able to vote in the March 6 primary if the oath had not been revoked.
Although Gingrich is now free to vote in his own state’s presidential primary, one wonders if he will vote, because his choices are limited to Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, and write-ins are not permitted.
On January 21, South Carolina’s Republican Party held its primary. The unofficial vote totals, according to Politico, are: Gingrich 243,153; Romney 167,279; Santorum 102,055; Paul 77,993; Cain 6,324; Perry 2,494; Huntsman 1,161; Bachmann 494; Johnson 213.
When one compares the New Hampshire Republican primary vote for the candidates who had withdrawn by the time of that primary, one sees that Herman Cain’s vote in South Carolina is significantly larger than his New Hampshire vote, something that is untrue for the other candidates who were on both ballots but who had withdrawn when New Hampshire voted.
Three candidates were on the ballot in both states, and had withdrawn before either primary: Michele Bachmann, Gary Johnson, and Herman Cain. In the New Hampshire Republican primary, Cain only polled 161 votes; Bachmann polled 350 votes; and Johnson polled 181 votes. The Bachmann vote in both states was about the same in each state; the Johnson vote in each state was about the same; but the Cain vote in South Carolina was forty times bigger than his New Hampshire vote. Furthermore, the final South Carolina returns will probably show slightly bigger totals for each candidate. Stephen Colbert seems to have made his influence felt.