Monthly Archives: February 2013

Senate Ballot Access Reform Bill Passes Without A Title

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On February 27, the Senate heard and passed SB668, ballot access reform, on a vote of 42-0. This bill now goes on to the House for consideration. However, the bill was not amended to change the 5% language it current holds. This means that the inconsistency between it and the House version, HB2134, remains. Senator Rob Johnson did acknowledge that disparity and as such requested that the title be stricken before the vote. Unfortunately, that will not help the effort to bring reform to the state.

Richard Prawdzienski of the Oklahoma Libertarian Party commented.

Striking the title devalues the vote of 42-0.  Without a title, the bill has to come back to the Senate to have the title placed back on if bill gets a pass vote in the House.  If more language is added, it means the bill must be heard in a conference. Many bills in conference die a quiet death.

Having ballot access reform assigned to a conference is one of the fears of many supporters of reform. That had been the fate of all recent attempts that passed the House and Senate. In each of those previous attempts, the Senate part of the conference committee refused to hear the bills and they died.

At this point, we are waiting to hear about progress on HB2134. It has yet to be placed on the agenda for the House. Please contact your Representative and ask them to support HB2134 in its current form.

Lessons Learned From FEC’s Presidential Election Results

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The Federal Election Commission recently released the official results from the 2012 Presidential Election (PDF). Just this information alone can teach us a lot about the political climate around the country. It also provides us with a few things that we can use to help in our efforts to bring ballot access reform to Oklahoma.

To start off, this report solidifies one fact that we have oft repeated here. Oklahoma is the only state to have limited its voters to two choices for President. This is the third Presidential election in a row that this has happened. The next fewest candidates on any ballot in the US was four candidates. Three states had that low ball, Hawaii, Missouri and South Dakota. That’s right, the next lowest number of candidates on a ballot doubled what was on the Oklahoma ballot.

Here are a few statistics from this report. The median number of candidates on any state ballot counting and not counting Oklahoma is eight. If you look at this on average, the average number of candidates on the ballot, including Oklahoma’s, is 7.92. Without counting Oklahoma, the average number of candidates on the ballot is eight. This means that Oklahoma has limited the number of candidates to a quarter that of the average in the US. The average voter outside of Oklahoma gets six more candidates than we do. That is rather depressing. Continue reading →

HB2134 Passes House Rules Committee Unopposed and Unamended

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The House Rules Committee voted unanimously to pass HB2134 which would reduce the number of signatures required to form a new party to 5,000. While similar bills have been passed in the House in previous years, this is the first bill to make it out of the Rules Committee with the 5,000 signature language in tact. Previous bills had been amended to change the language to 3% of the last general election or a flat 22,500 signatures. So this is a great start for reform this year.

With SB668 in the Senate having language reflecting 5% of the last Gubernatorial election, we still have some rough times ahead. It is important that the House pass HB2134 unamended and that the Senate either amend SB668 to match the House bill or to drop SB668 and adopt HB2134 when it passes out of the House. Please contact your State Representative and Senator and ask them to support HB2134 and the 5,000 signature requirement is contains.

Senate Rules Committee Passes SB76 On Strict Party Line Vote

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SB76 is a Senate Bill that would greatly increase the fees associated with filing for candidacy for office. The fee increases range from double to triple (an original version of the bill incorrectly listed the current filing fees, thus leading the misconception that some fees were tripled) the current fees. It what can only be seen as Republican support for fewer people running for office, the Senate Rules Committee passed the bill (PDF) on a strict party line vote. The 14 Republican members of the committee voted to pass the bill while the 5 Democratic members voted against it. This bill now goes on to the Senate floor for a vote.

Please contact your Senator and ask them to vote against this bill. This bill will severely reduce the number of people running for office. With roughly 50% of House and Senate seats going unopposed each election, that is not something that we need. If you are looking for an example of a letter you could send, please see the letter I wrote to Senator Fields.

HB2134 Will Be Heard In Rules Committee Wednesday

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On Wednesday, February 20th at 9am, the House Rules Committee will be voting on whether to advance HB2134. This is an important step in the process as this meeting, of only a small number of House members, has the potential to kill the bill for the year. It is important that you contact the House Rules Committee and ask that this bill be passed to the floor for a vote. It is also important to stress that this bill, which would change the signature requirement to form a new party to a flat 5,000, be unchanged. We will be listening in on the meeting and provide updates tomorrow.

Letter To The Editor Published In Tulsa World

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Today, the Tulsa World published my Letter to the Editor. This letter was pretty much word for word my letter to NewsOK, but the World made several edits. Nothing that changed the meaning in any way, just the flow. It is great to see that the World finally picked it up. This letter has sparked a pretty great conversation in the comments that had yet to exist on the Tulsa World website.

I will express one aside here. The Tulsa World is a supporter of what are called “paywalls” in which non-subscribing readers are blocked from reading more than 10 or so articles a month. This means that it is likely that some of you may not be able to read the letter or the comments. This is one reason why I like to post the letter contents in full. Continue reading →

SB668 Passes Senate Rules Committee With Amendments

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Wednesday, February 13th, the Senate Rules Committee voted 19-0 to pass SB668, Ballot Access Reform, with an amendment which Senator Johnson introduced in the meeting. The amendment grants the Election Board greater authority to answer questions and resolve disputes(pdf) over who is authorized to represent a new party in the state. It reads as follows:

In the event a question or dispute arises as to which person or persons have the authority to act on behalf of a recognized political party, the Secretary of the State Election Board shall have the authority to make such determination based on relevant state statutes, official documents filed with the Secretary of the State Election Board, the party’s by-laws, and, if possible, consultation with the party’s national chair or executive committee.

This amendment seems to be targeted at situations such as this past Presidential Election in which the state chapter of the Americans Elect Party tried to nominate the Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson. That nomination eventually went to the State Supreme Court which ruled that the state party did not have authorization to nominate a Presidential Candidate because the national party refused to hold a convention. This amendment would seem to allow the Election Board the power to resolve these disputes without going to court.

Unfortunately, this is the only amendment and one that is not really necessary. It would have been preferable to have the bill amended to require a set 5,000 signatures. I have not heard back from Senator Johnson or any other members of the Rules Committee on that matter.

“What Are Legislators Afraid Of?” Letter to News OK

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Today, Rena Guay had a letter published on NewsOK showing her support for ballot access reform. She also calls out the current efforts for not going far enough and allowing for write-ins.

We agree. Oklahoma is one of the few states that do not allow for write-in candidates for any election. This needs to change. When people do not see a candidate they can support on the ballot, they would rather stay home than vote for someone they don’t support. Allowing for write-ins would provide those people and opportunity to cast a vote for the person they support while at the same time declaring their no confidence vote in the named candidates.

I agree with E. Zachary Knight (Your Views, Feb. 6) that Oklahoma needs ballot access reform. However, Knight didn’t go far enough, and neither do proposed changes to ballot access from the Legislature. In addition to reducing the number of signatures needed to start a new party, Oklahomans need the right to write in candidates on the ballot, like 42 other states. Other impediments to access, and thus an absence of real democracy, remain.

What are our legislators afraid of? The voters who put them in office to begin with? This isn’t some radical left-wing agenda that Oklahoma conservatives need to stave off. This is democracy! If the policymakers at the Capitol are going to continue this ridiculous stonewalling on ballot reform, they need to offer Oklahomans a good explanation. In the meantime, those citizens should contact their representatives and tell them to start making these commons-sense, democratic changes to Oklahoma law and bring us into the modern era of ballot access and voting rights.

Rena Guay, Oklahoma City

Letter To The Editor Published In NewsOK Asking For Reform

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I regularly send letters to the editor. I find it to be a great way to address issues that often get overlooked by the media. Ballot Access Reform is one of those issue. Of all the media sites in Oklahoma, NewsOK seems to be one of the easier outlets to get a letter published. While NewsOK already took the stance that Oklahoma needs reform, that was many weeks before the Legislative session began. So it is important to keep this issue in the forefront of the media. So I sent a letter to NewsOK and other media outlets and NewsOK was the first to publish it.

So here is the original unedited version of the letter:

Once again, Ballot Access Reform is on the table in Oklahoma. Will this year be the year that Oklahoma joins the rest of the US in easing the requirements to form a new party? Will this year be the year that Oklahoma citizens can look forward to real choice in future Presidential elections? Or will we see a continuation of the status quo?

Unfortunately, things are off to a very rocky start. While bills have been introduced in both the State House and Senate, these bills are in the exact same position similar bills were in the past two Legislative Sessions. That position ended with prior efforts dying in Committee. The House version, HB 2134, reduces the signature requirement to 5,000 signatures, the same requirement needed prior to 1974. Yet, the Senate version, SB 668, retains the current 5% requirement but drops the Presidential elections from the equation. This has been the hard Senate line for many years.

It is time for the Senate to end its war on Oklahoma voter choice and amend SB 668 to reflect the language introduced in the House. There are no valid reasons for keeping the status quo. There are no valid reasons for blocking a change for the better in Oklahoma politics. It is time for change. If three Presidential Elections in a Row where Oklahoma was the only state in the US with two choices on the ballot is not evidence to support that, then what is? If three Presidential elections in a row with lower voter turnout than the previous election is not evidence in support of that, then what is?

The following was published on February 6, 2013. I like to post both versions of the letter as it helps to see what edits may get made to your own letters.

Ballot access reform is again on the table in Oklahoma. Will this be the year that we join the rest of the United States in easing the requirements to form a new party? Will this be the year Oklahomans can look forward to real choice in future presidential elections? Or will we see a continuation of the status quo?

Unfortunately, things are off to a rocky start. While bills have been introduced in both houses of the Legislature, these bills are in the same position as similar bills were in the past two legislative sessions. That position ended with prior efforts dying in committee. The House version, House Bill 2134, reduces the signature requirement to 5,000, the same requirement needed prior to 1974. Yet the Senate version, Senate Bill 668, retains the current 5 percent requirement but drops the presidential elections from the equation. This has been the hard Senate line for many years.

It’s time for the Senate to end its war on Oklahoma voter choice and amend SB 668 to reflect the language introduced in the House. There are no valid reasons for keeping the status quo and blocking a change for the better in Oklahoma politics. It’s time for change. If three presidential elections in a row when Oklahoma was the only state with two choices on the ballot isn’t evidence to support that, what is?

So please, write letters to every newspaper you can and voice your support for reform in this state. The more voices that are aired, the more will be heard.