Kenneth J. Block, who founded the Rhode Island Moderate Party, will be its gubernatorial candidate this year. The party is on the ballot, but it will go off the ballot unless it polls at least 5% for Governor. See this news story.
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On February 15, the Minnesota Senate passed SF 2251, which moves the primary from September 14 to August 10. If the bill is signed into law it will take effect this year. It also indirectly moves the deadline for non-presidential independent candidate petitions from July to June, and it also makes the deadline to qualify a new party earlier than it has been.
Professor Michael Malbin, Executive Director of the Campaign Finance lnstitute, has renewed the Institute’s advocacy of freeing up parties’ ability to decide how to spend their funds . See here.
Current federal campaign law lets political parties spend as much money as they wish on uncoordinated spending on behalf of their own nominees. But the federal law limits how much money the parties can spend on their own nominees, if the parties and the nominees coordinate the spending.
Steve Rankin’s blog Free Citizen has this interesting description of the evidence submitted by the Idaho Republican Party, in the party’s lawsuit to obtain a semi-closed primary for itself. Currently, Idaho has open primaries, which means that any voter is free to choose any party’s primary ballot.
Louisiana elects its state officers in the odd years before presidential elections. However, in the fall of 2010, Louisiana will hold a special election to fill the vacancy in the Lieutenant Governorship. The office is vacant because the recent past Lieutenant Governor, Mitch Landrieu, resigned this month to become Mayor of New Orleans.
Effective in 2008, Louisiana changed its congressional elections from a top-two system, to a semi-closed primary system. The 2010 election will be the first time that Louisiana has held a special election to fill a statewide state office that is simultaneous with a congressional election. It may be awkward for the state to hold an election that uses one type of system for U.S. Senate, and an entirely different system for Lieutenant Governor. Details on how the state will handle this are not available on Tuesday, February 16, because state offices are closed for Mardi Gras.