Last week, Alabama House Speaker Mac McCutcheon spoke to a Republican meeting. According to a newspaper story, he said the Libertarian Party and the Democratic Party are growing stronger in Alabama. See the next-to-the-last paragraph in this story.
On September 21, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, a Democrat, asked the legislature to pass a state constitutional amendment that would authorize the statewide initiative process. See this story.
On September 29, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Pitman, an Obama appointee, upheld all the Texas ballot access laws that affect independent candidates and minor parties, except that he ruled that it is unconstitutional for the state to ban electronic signatures. Miller v Hughs, w.d., 1:19cv-700. The opinion is rather short, considering all the laws that were challenged, and appears to have made significant factual errors and also to have overlooked a great deal of the evidence.
Here is the 28-page Opinion.
A Suffolk University/Boston Globe Poll for the New Hampshire Senate race shows this result: Democrat Maggie Hassan 49.6%; Republican Don Bolduc 41.2%; Libertarian Jeremy Kauffman 2.6%; undecided 6.6%. See it here.
For the gubernatorial race: Republican Chris Sununu 53%; Democrat 36%; Libertarian Kelly Halldorson 2%; Libertarian Karlyn Borysenko 2%; undecided 8%.
Most states that have partisan registration allow voters to be registered into unqualified parties. However, many such states don’t post the data for unqualified parties on their websites.
Recently, the Nevada Secretary of State upgraded her website, so that it now shows not only the number of registered voters in each of the four qualified parties, but also the number for the Green Party and the Natural Law Party, parties which were formerly qualified. See here.
The Nevada Libertarian Party has registration of .88% of the state total. If the top-five initiative passes and takes effect, the party will go off the ballot unless it either has its registration up to 1%, or unless the party polls at least 1% of the vote for president. In 2020 it got 1.05% for president in Nevada.
Under the existing law, a party can remain on the ballot if it polls 1% of the statewide vote for any partisan office, so it has been quite easy for the Libertarian Party to meet that vote test. Voters are always far more generous with their votes for minor parties, for less important office. However, under the top-five initiative, parties don’t have nominees any longer, except for president, so that easy method of staying on the ballot would vanish.
Even if the voters pass the top-five initiative in November 2022, it won’t go into effect unless they also pass it in November 2024.
