Late last year, William D. Johnson and others announced the formation of a new political party, called the American Third Position. It has filed for status as a political body in California, but otherwise does not seem to have carried out any ballot access work.
The party’s web page is here. The program says, “We will stop all immigration into America, except in special cases.” The party’s logo includes the figure of Charles Lindbergh.
Columbia, South Carolina is holding its regular election for city officers on April 6. One city council district, district 2, was not scheduled to have an election this year. However, the incumbent resigned abruptly on March 9. The city then set a special election for that district for April 6, giving candidates only 4 days to file.
On March 29, a federal lawsuit was filed to stop the special election. See this story. Plaintiffs charge that the election cannot be fair because potential candidates had such a narrow window in which to file. However, the basis for the federal lawsuit is that the city has changed its procedures for this special election and did not pre-clear those changes with the U.S. Justice Department. Absentee voting had already started for the regularly city election, and voters who already voted, who live in District 2, were given ballots that didn’t even include the special election.
In Pennsylvania, candidates seeking a place on a partisan primary ballot must submit petitions. The Pennsylvania primary this year is May 18. In Pennsylvania, elections officials assume that all petitions that contain, on their face, at least many signatures as are legally required, are valid.
However, any private individual who is a member of the same party may challenge any candidate’s primary ballot petition. The Democratic Party petition for one candidate for State Representative, 175th district, has been challenged. The challenged candidate is Daryl LaFountain. LaFountain has just learned that the challenge to his petition was submitted by fax, and that the fax machine used is the state government-owned fax machine in the district office of the incumbent. The incumbent, Representative Michael O’Brien, is running for re-election. On March 29, LaFountain’s attorney filed a motion with the court that is hearing the challenge to LaFountain’s petition. The motion asks that the challenge be dismissed because the objector is using state government resources for the challenge. It will be interesting to see what happens next. The formal name of the challenge in court is: In re The Nomination Petitions and Papers of Daryl La Fountain, 235 MD 2010.
The March 31 issue of the Cleveland Plain Dealer has this editorial, criticizing Ohio Secretary of State’s recent directive that changes the rules on which party’s primary ballot a voter may select in the May 2010 primary. As the editorial says, Ohio is an open primary state, meaning that the voter registration form does not ask voters to choose a party. But the Secretary of State’s directive says that if someone voted in one party’s primary in 2008, that same voter can’t choose a different party’s primary in 2008 unless that voter signs a declaration of loyalty to that party’s ideas.
The March 31 issue of the Cleveland Plain Dealer has this editorial, criticizing Ohio Secretary of State’s recent directive that changes the rules on which party’s primary ballot a voter may select in the May 2010 primary. As the editorial says, Ohio is an open primary state, meaning that the voter registration form does not ask voters to choose a party. But the Secretary of State’s directive says that if someone voted in one party’s primary in 2008, that same voter can’t choose a different party’s primary in 2008 unless that voter signs a declaration of loyalty to that party’s ideas.
