On July 15, the New Mexico Forward Party filed a federal lawsuit against the ballot access laws. New Mexico Forward Party v Toulouse Oliver, 1:26cv-2286. Here is the Complaint. Although the Forward Party successfully qualified as a minor party earlier this year, it will have almost no nominees on the ballot this year because of a unique New Mexico law that forces the nominees of a qualified party that nominates by convention to submit their own individual petitions after they have been nominated. For statewide office this year, the nominee petitions are over 14,000 signatures, and the petitioning can’t start until March of the election year.

On July 14, the California Attorney General released his summary of the proposed initiative that would repeal the top-two system. This is what would appear on the ballot, if the initiative gets enough valid signatures. Petitioning for the initiative has not started yet.

On July 13, New Hampshire filed this brief in Day v New Hampshire Secretary of State, 1:26cv-499. This is the lawsuit filed by Aaron Day, an independent candidate for U.S. Senate, to get on the ballot. The Secretary of State had denied him because he had moved within New Hampshire and had not yet completed registering to vote at his new address. Day had cited three cases in which U.S. Courts of Appeals had ruled that states cannot even require congressional candidates to be registered voters, because states cannot add to the qualifications for Congress. The state’s brief doesn’t mention any of these cases.