In presidential years, Washington elects a partisan statewide office called Commissioner of Public Lands. Recently a Washington Democratic State Senator, Rebecca Saldana, withdrew from the primary, because otherwise there would have been four strong Democratic candidates for that office, and only two Republicans for the same office. She withdrew because she was afraid the top-two system would result in the two Republicans placing first and second, thus depriving any Democrat from being on the November ballot.

This article says the same thing happened to the Democratic Party in 2016, in the State Treasurer’s race; and it happened to the Republican Party in 2020 in the Lieutenant Governor’s race; and it happened to the Republican Party in the 2020 special election for Secretary of State. Thanks to Fairvote for the link.

Alabama Senator Merika Coleman (D-Birmingham) has introduced SB 318, to move the date for qualified parties to certify the names of their presidential nominees from 82 days before the election, to 74 days before. This would solve the problem that the existing deadline is earlier than this year’s Democratic national convention.

She has also introduced SB 324, which moves the certification deadline in the same way, and also moves the deadline for independent presidential candidate petitions to a later date. SB 324 has seven co-sponsors.

On April 1, the Georgia legislature passed HB 1312, which postpones the statewide partisan election for Public Service Commission from November 2024 to a special election in 2025. This is a severe blow to the Georgia Libertarian Party, because without this bill, Public Service Commissioner and President would have been the only statewide offices on the November 2024 ballot. A party must poll a number of votes for any statewide race equal to 1% of the number of registered voters, every two years, in order to stay on the ballot for statewide offices.

If Governor Brian Kemp signs this bill, President will be the only statewide office on the November 2024 ballot, and unless the Libertarian presidential nominee does exceptionally well in Georgia, the party will lose its qualified status (which only exists for all the statewide offices, but not district offices). Only in 2016 did the Libertarian Party poll enough votes for president to meet the vote test.

Consumer groups are angered by the bill and are hoping to persuade the Governor to veto the bill.