No Labels Apparently No Longer Aiming for 50 State Ballot Access for its Potential Presidential Ticket

From Politico’s Playbook newsletter from earlier today:

SPOILER ALERT — At a pivotal virtual meeting tomorrow, No Labels members are expected to vote to jump into the presidential race — though the group won’t yet select its ticket, AP’s Thomas Beaumont and Steve Peoples report.

Strategy shift?: Notably, No Labels is no longer saying they’re trying to get on the ballot in all 50 states, as they’ve long touted as their ambition for 2024 (and which No Labels still currently says on their website), Daniel Lippman writes in. In an op-ed in the Dallas Morning News last week, No Labels honcho NANCY JACOBSON wrote, “We have a strategy to get on the majority of state ballots for an independent presidential ticket.” A No Labels spokesperson didn’t respond to a request for comment on the change.

Thanks to Politico and politicalwire.com for the heads up!

Indiana Supreme Court Explains Why it Kept John Rust Off the Republican Primary Ballot for U.S. Senate

On March 6, the Indiana Supreme Court released its opinion in Morales v Rust, 23S-PL-371, the lawsuit over the requirements to get on a primary ballot. The law requires candidates to have voted in each of that party’s two previous primaries, although the party can grant a waiver.

The Court had already let it be known on February 27 that the law had been upheld, but it didn’t release its opinion until March 6. Here it is. The vote was 3-2, something that had not been known back on February 27.

The opinion of two justices, upholding the law, is 41 pages. A concurrence by a third justice is 18 pages. The dissent is 25 pages.

Two New York Times Politics Reporters Criticize California’s Top-Two System

On March 6, two New York Times reporters who cover politics, Shane Goldmacher and Adam Nagourney, wrote “One clear loser in California’s primary: the top-two nonpartisan primary system. They say, “It was sold on good government reform, meant to drain partisanship and promote centrist politicians. Instead, it showed itself – again – to be as vulnerable as traditional primaries to partisan gamesmanship.” See this link, although it may be behind a paywall. It is at the end of the column, the title of which is “Five Takeaways from Super Tuesday.”