New Hampshire HB 1330 was defeated in Committee last month by 13-3. It would have allowed voters to choose any party’s primary ballot, regardless of how that voter was registered.
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Mississippi HB 760 failed to advance, and it is now dead. It would have said that an elected official who changes parties is deemed to have resigned.
The Democracy Lab Podcast, hosted by Rob Richie, has this 43-minute podcast featuring the editors of Ballot Access News.
On March 4, Randy Flowers, an independent candidate for U.S. Houses from the 17th district of Illinois, filed a federal lawsuit against the petition requirements for independent candidates for U.S. House. Here is the Complaint in Flowers v Illinois State Board of Elections, c.d., 4:26cv-4062. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court judge Sara Darrow.
Kevin Kiley, who had been elected as a California Republican member of Congress in 2024, has switched his registration to independent. He will run for re-election in the Sixth U.S. House district this year. In California, independent candidates are forced to have the label “no party preference.”
When Kiley had been in the California legislature, he had introduced a bill to repeal the top-two system. While a member of Congress, he introduced a bill to ban mid-decade U.S. House redistricting.
Kiley is the first independent from California in Congress since William Kent, who was elected as an independent from Marin County in 1912 and 1914.