On December 15, the Pennsylvania Attorney General indicted four more Pennsylvania public employees or officials connected with the state legislature, for using public resources to help on election campaigns. One of those indicted is a legislator, Bill DeWeese, who is the House Democratic whip and who has been a Speaker of the House in the past. See this story.

These indictments are in addition to others announced earlier this year. Part of the political work done by public employees was working on petition challenges to the Green Party statewide petition in 2006, and the Ralph Nader petition in 2004.

In 2008, the Nebraska legislature made it illegal for out-of-state residents to circulate petitions in Nebraska. A lawsuit, challenging that restriction, plus a few other restrictions, was filed on December 16. The North Platte Telegraph has this interview with one of the plaintiffs, Mike Groene, in which Groene explains why he is opposed to the out-of-state circulator ban. Groene is chair of the Western Nebraska Taxpayer Association.

The Reform Party has set a teleconference national committee meeting for December 19, Saturday. Now that the Texas-based officers have won the federal lawsuit in New York establishing their ownership of the party’s trademark, the party hopes to rebuild. It is still ballot-qualified in Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. That is more states than any other nationally-organized party, except for the Democratic, Republican, Libertarian, Green and Constitution Parties. The Working Families Party is still not a nationally-organized party.