On September 7, the Alaskan Independence Party pick for Lieutenant Governor, Norm Olson, withdrew. He said he was only interested in running for Lieutenant Governor with Bill Walker, who had last month lost the Republican gubernatorial primary. Because the Alaskan Independence Party decided to stick with its original gubernatorial candidate (Don Wright), Olson is declining. The party has until September 15 to find someone else. See this story.
West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin, who is the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, says he wants to debate all three of his opponents. See this story. His opponents are Republican John Raese, Mountain Party nominee Jesse Johnson, and Constitution Party nominee Jeff Becker.
Recently, Hill Research Consultants released a poll of the Texas gubernatorial race. See the poll questions here, especially question 3, which asks respondents who they favor in that race. The pollster is instructed to ask the respondent if he or she favors Rick Perry, Republican, or Bill White, Democrat. The instructions say “DO NOT READ” any other choices, but if the respondent nevertheless mentions the Libertarian Party nominee, or the Green Party nominee (both of whom are on the ballot), that unsolicited information is then recorded, but only into a single category. Not surprisingly, 17% of the respondents either refuse to answer the question, or say, “Neither”, or say they are undecided. The Libertarian Party nominee is Katherine Glass; the Green nominee is Deb Shafto.
On September 7, the Arizona Green Party filed a lawsuit in federal court to require the Secretary of State to remove the names of certain Green Party nominees from the November ballot. These nominees are people who won the Arizona Green Party primary last month, even though they have no connection with the party leadership or party activists. The evidence seems clear that various Republicans persuaded them to file as declared write-in candidates in the Green Party primary, on the last day for filing as a declared write-in in the primary. Because Green Party activists didn’t know about these candidacies, they were unable to counter them with rival candidates for the same office. Here is the Complaint and here is the motion for a temporary restraining order.
The case is Arizona Green Party v Bennett, cv10-1902. Because the Secretary of State would like the counties to print their ballots starting September 9, this case is moving very quickly and could conceivably be decided on September 8 or September 9. UPDATE: the case has a hearing at 1 p.m. on September 9. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge David Campbell, a Bush Jr. appointee.
On September 7, two Republicans sued the Colorado Secretary of State, alleging that the Secretary of State should not have permitted the Constitution Party to nominate Tancredo. See this story. A hearing will be held in state court on September 13. The case is Olson v Buescher, 10-cv-4180.
