The Washington Post has this story, mentioning that last week former Virginia Congressman Virgil Goode filed with the Federal Election Commission as a presidential candidate. The Post correctly speculates that Goode will seek the Constitution Party nomination. He is expected to formally announce his candidacy in a week.
Now that the 3-judge U.S. District Court in San Antonio has informally told the major parties that their primaries will be no earlier than May 29, and possibly later, the Republican Party is planning to change the tradition that precinct conventions are held the evening of primary day. The party is working on a plan to hold precinct conventions, and county conventions, before the primary. See this message from the party leadership.
At noon on February 16, the New Mexico legislature adjourned for the year. SB 218, the bill to require a straight-ticket device on general election ballots, did not receive a vote in the House, so it is dead for this year.
States with a straight-ticket device are Alabama, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia. It is likely that the North Carolina legislature will repeal the straight-ticket device when it meets in regular session in May 2012. The bill to eliminate it, SB 47, passed the State Senate last year.
On February 16, the North Carolina legislature convenes for a 3-day special session. Although the special session was called to consider election law bills, according to this story, legislative leaders say they will not vote on any bill in the February session. Instead, bills will only move in the regular session that starts in May.
This appears to mean that HB 32, the ballot access bill that passed the House last year, won’t get a vote in the State Senate until May at the earliest. The bill substantially eases the number of signatures required for minor parties and independent candidates.
According to this story, the Indiana Election Commission will decide on February 24 whether to leave Rick Santorum on the Republican presidential primary ballot. The story also says that Mitt Romney’s campaign co-chair for Indiana is one of the four people who will decide.
