CNN on October 2 ran a short segment titled, “Time Ripe for Third Party?”, triggered by media interest in Rick Nagin’s run-off for a city council set in Cleveland. Nagin associates himself with the Democratic Party but is also a member of the Communist Party and a reporter for the party’s newspaper. The election is November 3, 2009. The segment also features Bob Barr, and refers to strong independent gubernatorial candidates in New Jersey, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Thanks to Jared Cowing for the link.

On October 2, a New York State Supreme Court in Rensselaer County invalidated 33 absentee votes cast in the Working Families Party primary of September 15, 2009. See this story. The case is Lambertsen v Bugbee, 230629. The Working Families Party primary was a battle between some Republican candidates versus some Democratic candidates, for County Legislature and Troy City Council. There were no WFP members running in that primary. The 33 absentee ballots were found fraudulent, filed in the names of voters who never received the ballots (and in most cases, had not even requested absentee ballots).

It appears that one or two Democratic Party partisans are responsible for the fraud, but no criminal charges have been filed yet against anyone.

In 2008, the California legislature passed AB 583, which would institute public funding in California, starting in 2014, only for the Secretary of State race. The law cannot go into effect unless it is approved by the voters, so it will be on the June 2010 ballot.

On August 25, 2009, the Institute of Governmental Advocates filed a lawsuit in state court to remove the measure from the June 2010 ballot. The Institute represents lobbyists. The bill provides that most of the money to pay for public funding would be raised by increasing the fee to register as a lobbyist, from $25 every two years, to $700 every two years. The case is Institute of Governmental Advocates v Bowen, Superior Court, Sacramento, 34-2009. Here is the Complaint. The Institute argues that the measure is a tax increase, so it should have been passed by two-thirds of each house of the legislature to have any effect (the California Constitution doesn’t permit tax increases without a two-thirds vote in the legislature). The Institute also argues that the amount of the tax violates the First Amendment.