A Rasmussen Poll released on November 19 shows that if the election for Governor of California were being held now, no candidate has a majority, assuming the Democratic nominee is Jerry Brown and that the Republican nominee is Meg Whitman. The results are: Brown 41%, Whitman 41%, other 3%, undecided 14%. See here for more details.
On November 19, a Sacramento Superior Court ruled that a public funding measure that is set to be on the June 2010 ballot should remain on that ballot. To read the ruling, see here and then click on “Institute of Governmental Advocates v Bowen.” The ruling says that it is more appropriate to hear the challenge to the measure after the voters vote on it, assuming that it does indeed pass. The ruling is only tentative, and the plaintiff has arranged that there will be oral argument at 9 a.m. on November 20 in this case.
Mark McKinnon, writing at his blog Daily Beast, has this column explaining why he feels Mayor Michael Bloomberg could be a viable independent presidential candidate in 2012. Thanks to Nancy Hanks of the Hankster for the link.
On November 18, the Arizona Green Party sued to overturn an Arizona law that won’t let non-residents circulate petitions to recognize a new or previously unqualified political party. The party also sued over the deadline for such petitions, as applied to the 2010 election. The legislature in 2009 moved the deadline for such petitions from March to February. The party does not allege that the new deadline is unconstitutional on its face, but that due process requires that the state not implement the earlier deadline in 2010, since the change was made while the process was underway.
The case is Arizona Green Party v Bennett, 2:09-cv-2412. It was assigned to Judge Susan Bolton, a Clinton appointee. The 9th circuit ruled last year that Arizona may not ban out-of-state circulators, in a case filed by Ralph Nader in 2004 when he was an independent presidential candidate. In response, the 2009 session of the Arizona legislature legalized out-of-state circulators for independent presidential candidate petitions, but kept the residency requirement in place for all other types of petitions.
On November 19, Faye Coffield filed her rebuttal brief in the 11th circuit in Coffield v Handel, 09-13277. She is challenging the petition required for independent and minor party candidates for the U.S. House in Georgia. That procedure, obtaining 5% of the number of registered voters on a petition, is so difficult that it has not been used since 1964, when an independent candidate did the petition. Back in 1964, the petition was due in October and the signatures weren’t checked, and county boundaries matched U.S. House district boundaries.
The state’s brief, filed earlier this month, is not available in electronic format. However, it simply argues that the 5% petition has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, in 1971, in Jenness v Fortson. However, as Coffield’s briefs point out, the plaintiffs in Jenness v Fortson did not introduce any evidence about the difficulty of complying with the law. They merely argued as a matter of logic and law that since Republicans and Democrats can run in primaries without any petition, that equal protection forbids Georgia from requiring any signatures from any candidates.
