On January 16, Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said he will the decision in No Labels Party v Fontes, 2:23cv-2172. The decision said that No Labels Party has a freedom of association right to block candidates for congress and partisan state office from filing to get on its primary ballot.
This essay was published today and is excerpted from Mr. Hasen’s forthcoming book “A Right to Vote: How a Constitutional Amendment Can Safeguard American Democracy.”
On January 16, the Kansas Secretary of State determined that the petition to put the No Labels Party on the ballot is valid. This is the first party petition that has succeeded in Kansas since 1998, when the Constitution Party petition was approved; except that in 2011 the American Elects party petition was also successful (but American Elects didn’t run any candidates in Kansas and so went off the ballot in 2012).
The Green Party has never been a qualified party in Kansas. The law requires 20,180 signatures and they must be collected in six months. The time limit hurts efforts by parties that rely on volunteers instead of paid circulators.
On January 16, a Washington state trial judge in Kitsap County dismissed a challenge filed to the Trump candidacy in the Republican presidential primary, on the grounds that the challenge should have been filed in the county that contains the state capital, Thurston County. The challengers had also filed in Thurston County, and that challenge will go ahead. Thanks toDaryl Perry for the lnews.
