States that still haven’t finished holding congressional primaries this year are Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.
U.S. House member Kelly Morrison (D-Minnesota) has introduced HR 9634. It would help states and localities with funding if they are switching to Ranked Choice Voting. The text is still not available on the congressional website, but when it is, this post will be amended to link to the text.
On July 8, a Florida state trial court issued an opinion in Stark v Byrd, Circuit Court, 2nd district, Leon County, 2026CA-1311. This is the case over whether Paula Stark, an incumbent Republican member of the Florida legislature, should be on the Republican primary ballot. The judge ruled that she should not be on the ballot because she didn’t submit one particular campaign finance form. She alleged that her campaign treasurer had turned in the form and that the election office employee had handed it back. But the judge did not believe this claim, and thought it most likely that the campaign treasurer had not handed it in.
Stark can’t be a write-in candidate in November because it is already too late to file as a declared write-in candidate in Florida. Florida has the earliest deadline for filing as a write-in candidate in the nation. It somewhat defeats the purpose of having write-in space on the general election ballot for the deadline to be so early. As a result, no Republican will be on the general election ballot, and the Democratic nominee will be the automatic winner.
According to this story, the Democratic Party has been left without a nominee in one of the legislative districts in Fargo, North Dakota. And the district is strongly Democratic. But the Democratic incumbent died, and the party has no way to replace him. So, an independent candidate who leans Democratic has qualified. Cara Cody-Braun, if she wins, will be the first person elected as an independent to the North Dakota legislature since 1966. However, North Dakota did elect an independent candidate to be Secretary of State in 2018.
On July 6, the South Carolina Republican Party filed a federal lawsuit to obtain a closed primary for itself. See this story. The case is South Carolina Republican Party v Bolchoz, 3:26cv-2699.
UPDATE: here is the Complaint. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Mary Geiger Lewis, an Obama appointee.
