On March 18, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Stein v Federal Election Commission, 23-771. The lower federal courts had refused to block the FEC from asking Jill Stein, the Green Party presidential nominee in 2016, for some of the funds back. The dispute involved the time period in which a presidential candidate seeking the nomination of several parties can raise private funds that get matched by the government. In the past, if a candidate was seeking the nomination of two parties, the period stopped when the later party decision was made. But in 2016, the FEC changed the rules and said the period ends once the first such political party makes a decision. Stein had been seeking both the Green Party nomination and the Peace & Freedom Party nomination. She now must repay the funds she raised after the Green Party presidential convention but before the Peace & Freedom presidential convention. It was a short period in August 2016, but she happened to have raised a large amount of money during that period.

She is seeking matching funds this year, in her quest for the 2024 Green nomination.

On Sunday, March 17, New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin said he believes New Jersey’s discriminatory ballot format in primaries is unconstitutional, and therefore he won’t let the state intervene in the lawsuit to defend that ballot format. This leaves it to attorneys for most of New Jersey’s counties to defend the law. See this story.

Governor Phil Murphy says he believes the law is constitutional. The case, Kim v Hanlon, 3:24cv-1098, has a hearing on Monday, March 18, before U.S. District Court Judge Zahid Quraishi.

All but two New Jersey counties use the same discriminatory ballot format in the general election. The Democratic and Republican Parties have party columns of their own, and their names are prominently at the head of those columns. But all other candidates, independents and the nominees of minor parties, are squeezed helter-skelter into other columns that are labelled “Nomination by Petition.” If the primary ballot access ballot format is held unconstitutional, it should be possible to get reform for the general election ballot format also. Thanks to David Sturrock for the link.

On March 7, the Idaho House passed HB 652 by a vote of 49-20. It lets petition signers remove their signatures from the petition, for up to five months past the time the deadline for submitting the signatures. The sponsor is Representative James Petzke (R-Meridian). A similar law in Florida was held to violate the Florida Constitution in 2010. Browning v Florida Hometown Democracy, 29 So. 3d 1053.