The Democratic National Committee Rules Committee meets today in Washington, D.C., to again think about a national plan on presidential primaries and caucuses. See this story.
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The Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry California has taken a position against Proposition 14, the top-two ballot measure on the June 8, 2010 ballot. See here. The UULMC represents the 80 Unitarian congregations in California, and is headquartered in Sacramento. Thanks to Cat Woods for the link.
Eastern Group Publications publishes ten different newspapers in Los Angeles County, all of which are in both Spanish and English. The chain originated in 1945 and is the oldest and largest chain of Hispanic-Owned bilingual newpapers in the United States. Its papers appear each Thursday. The May 20 issue asks its readers to vote “No” on Proposition 14, the top-two ballot measure that is on the June 8 ballot. See here. The newspaper is delivered to 104,000 households. Thanks to Jeff Trigg for this news.
Texas Greens are optimistic that their petition drive for 2010 will succeed. The deadline is Monday, May 24. Here is the link to the party’s web page electronic petition. However, the party is depending almost entirely on old-fashioned signatures on paper.
If the party does get on the ballot in Texas in 2010, it is almost certain to poll enough votes to also appear on the 2012 ballot, because this year no Democrat is running for State Comptroller. Greens do have a candidate for that office, as do Libertarians and Republicans. It is very likely the Green candidate for Comptroller will poll 5% and extend the party’s ballot status into 2012.
According to someone who was at the May 20 hearing in Buell v Monterey County, the 3-judge U.S. District Court will likely reject the Voting Rights Act claim and tell the county to hold its special election on June 22. The special election is to fill the vacant State Senate seat, 15th district. The seat is empty because State Senator Abel Maldonado resigned to become Lieutenant Governor. UPDATE: see this San Jose Mercury-News story.
The case was filed by persons who worry that a special election so soon after the regularly-scheduled June 8 primary will have a very low turnout. There are four candidates on the ballot, one Democrat, one Republican, one Libertarian, and one independent. If no one gets 50%, there will be a run-off among the same four candidates in August, which does seem rather silly.
The Voting Rights Act, section 5, requires Monterey County to pre-clear all election procedure changes with the U.S. Justice Department. The county is not opening all polling places and plaintiffs said that is a change that should have been pre-cleared.