Monthly Archives: February 2014

Randy Brogdon Drops Out Of Governor Race To Seek Senate Seat

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Randy BrogdonRandy Brogdon was the only Republican challenger to Mary Fallin’s nomination for Governor in 2014. That has now changed. Brogdon sent an email to backers of his campaign yesterday announcing his intent to drop outo the the governor’s race to seek the Senate seat being vacated by current Senator Tom Coburn.

In this letter, he writes about the dilemma he faced in making the decision to switch gears at this point in the race. He had been hesitant to go to Washington, but after considering it and talking to many people, he felt that he could do more for the cause of liberty if he were in Washington.

With Randy’s departure from the governor’s race, we are left with only three candidates. Incumbent Republican Mary Fallin, Democratic Joe Dorman, and Independent Richard Prawdzienski. Of the three left, only Richard has been actively engaged in changing Oklahoma’s harsh ballot access laws.

Full text of the letter below. Continue reading →

Richard Prawdzienski Announces Independent Bid For Governor’s Seat

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Richard PrawdzienskiOklahoma has its first Independent candidate for Governor for the 2014 election. Yesterday, Richard Prawdzienski announced his intent to run for governor.

Richard is a former chair of the Oklahoma Libertarian Party and has been active member of the effort to reform Oklahoma’s ballot access laws.

He has been a candidate for office before, in 2010 as an Independent candidate for Lt. Governor and in 2012 as an Independent for the State Senate seat for Edmond.

Along with his campaign for Governor, Richard is looking for others to run along side him this year.

Richard Prawdzienski, a former OKLP Chair, recently announced he will file for Governor and is building a Liberty Caucus of Republicans, Democrats and Independents to file for their Senate or House District.

Oklahoma has not had an Independent candidate for Governor since 2002. In that race, Gary Richardson ran as an Independent and earned 14.1% of the vote. We welcome a full slate of candidates in the governor election this year.

We are confident that Richard will make ballot access reform a priority in his campaign as well as his term in office if he wins the election.

National Popular Vote Bill Passes OK Senate On Bi-Partisan Lines; Concerns Over Lobbyist Activity Raised

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Last week, the Oklahoma Senate passed SB906, the National Popular Vote Bill, on a bi-partisan vote of 28-18. All 12 of Oklahoma’s Democratic Senators voted for the bill and 18 Republican Senators voted against it.

This bill would change the way Oklahoma assigns its seven electoral votes from the current popular Oklahoma vote getting all votes, to a system in which the winner of the national popular vote gets all of Oklahoma’s electoral votes. This proposal has its supporters and its detractors with many concerns raised. We highlighted a few of those concerns last year when this bill was introduced. In that article we wrote:

The truth is that yes, Oklahoma would be further marginalized by Presidential candidates in the event of a national popular vote. However, that wouldn’t be changing much from the current situation. As NewsOK states, Oklahoma has been pretty much a Presidential flyover state since the 60s.

We further wrote of a better alternative, that of proportional allocating of electoral votes based on the percentage of voted earned by each candidate.

However, there is a different concern raised by some members of the House, that of the amount of lobbying taking place to get this bill passed. Representative Jason Murphey recently wrote about the tremendous lobbying effort from out of state interests who want this bill passed. He wrote about how those lobbyists are taking Oklahoma Legislators on all expense paid trips to resorts in order to get them to vote for the bill.

To this end, the national popular vote group invaded Oklahoma with a high powered team of very sophisticated lobbyists. They wisely kept the issue under the radar and away from the eyes of the public while aggressively trying to convince legislators by using a series of convoluted logic for why this proposal would benefit conservatives.

They financed a series of out-of-state junkets to various vacation sites where they explained this logic against an exotic backdrop of recreational events.

Having succeeded in the Senate, they are preparing to go on the offensive in the House. On March 20, they will finance an all-expenses-paid junket to St. Croix. In this exotic venue, far away from the eyes of the public, they will attempt to convince Oklahoma House members to vote for the bill. Just a few days after they return to the mainland, House members will vote on the proposal.

These all expense paid trips were further confirmed with a letter published by Batesline. In this article it was confirmed that Fair Vote, a 501(c)(3) organization is behind these trips.

This lobbying effort calls into serious question the ability of the Oklahoma Legislature to make decisions based on the will of the people. If those Senators who voted for this proposal did so because of the free vacation they were given rather than because the people of Oklahoma want to see it passed, then they are not doing their jobs.

If the way Oklahoma allocates its electoral votes is to change, it should be done by the will of the people not by the will of out of state lobbyists buying legislators all expense paid vacations. We will continue to watch these developments and the further progress of this bill.

 

Lawsuit Challenging Voter ID Law Gets The Ok From The Oklahoma Supreme Court

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In 2010, a majority of Oklahoma voters approved a ballot measure requiring voters to show an approved ID before being allowed to vote. Supporters of the law claimed that it was needed to prevent voter fraud, but have never presented much evidence supporting the idea that this prevents any kind of known fraud.

Those opposed to the law spoke at length about how the law would disproportionately harm minorities, the elderly and the poor and be a barrier to their ability to cast a vote in elections.

Shortly after passing, the law was challenged by several Oklahoma voters in court. The question of standing, whether the person challenging the law has a reason to believe they are harmed by it, went all the way to the Oklahoma Supreme Court. When reviewing the case, the Court ruled that Delilah Christine Gentges, the person challenging the law, does have standing to sue the state over it.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court has ruled that a Tulsa County voter has legal standing to challenge the state’s Voter ID law.

The Supreme Court’s order sends the case back to Oklahoma County District Judge Lisa Davis to decide Gentges’ challenge to the law, which requires voters to prove their identity before voting.

While the lawsuit is far from resolved, this is a major step in the attempt to overturn the law. Had the Court ruled that Gentges did not have standing to sue, then the case would have taken a major blow and would have had to start again with a new client or argument.

It will likely be several more years before this issue is completely resolved, but there are many other challenges across the US with many resulting in Voter ID laws being overturned. One recent case was in Pennsylvania, in which the court ruled that state’s law to be unconstitutional.

This will be a case to watch for all people who believe in free and fair elections.

Letter To The Editor In Support Of Better Political Alternatives

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Earlier this week, James Mitchell of Oklahoma City had a letter to the editor published at NewsOK. in that letter, James advocated for better alternatives to the current two parties in Oklahoma. In this letter, James calls for more qualified Independent candidates as well as open primaries. He also laments the current voter mentality that has led to where we are today.

Here is James’ letter in full:

I agree with E. Zachary Knight (Your Views, Feb. 3) that there needs to be an alternative for voters other than Democrat, Republican and the tea party for state and national offices. However, in today’s political environment anyone who dares to be an independent thinker who’s not walking in lockstep with party ideology and who has the audacity to put the welfare of the state or nation ahead of the honorless party machines immediately commits political suicide. Voters have helped to create this environment with our excessive thirst for the extreme.

Getting independent candidates who are actually qualified to hold the offices and getting them to run is another major challenge. The Republican presidential primaries of 2012, for example, were a clown show. Fortunately, the only one of that group who was actually qualified did get the nomination. If independents are going to seriously challenge the established political machine, the candidates must be truly qualified to hold the offices they’re seeking.

Allowing open primaries in Oklahoma would be a major feat. In Oklahoma, change to what we’ve always done is hard to accomplish. Even when the benefits of the changes are as bold as the sky, there are still those who would attempt to take us backward. The Oklahoma City mayor’s race this year will be a good example.

Ballot Access Reform Bill Author Elected To House Speaker

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Representative Jeff HickmanYesterday, House Republicans met and elected a new House Speaker to replace outgoing Rep. TW Shannon who stepped down from the position to pursue a US Senate seat. This is great news for proponents of Ballot Access Reform for two reasons.

The first reason is that Rep Shannon was a key figure in blocking ballot access reform from a vote in 2013. We were never clear on his reasons but it doesn’t matter much at this point. He has stepped down as Speaker as he seeks the Republican nomination for the US Senate.

The second reason is that his new replacement is none other than HB2134’s author Representative Jeff Hickman. HB2134 is the bill that reduces the signatures required to form a new party from te current 5% requirement to a flat 5,000.

This is certainly a unique opportunity for ballot access reform in Oklahoma. I am unaware of any time in the past where the Speaker of the House was also a principal author of a ballot access reform bill. We certainly hope that Rep. Hickman will help insure that real reform advances through the House this year.

We ask all supporters of ballot access reform to send words of encouragement to the new Speaker and ask that HB2134 be heard on the floor.

Letter To The Editor Calling For More Independents To Run For Legislature

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In the lead up to the 2014 Legislative Session, we sent in a letter to the editor of NewsOK calling for more Independent voters to run. We highlighted why that is important for the state and for Ballot Access Reform efforts. Today, NewsOK published our letter. Here it is:

Oklahoma needs more candidates to run for office. In recent elections, fewer state legislative seats have received challenges. This means more legislators are getting too comfortable in their seats. When legislators get too comfortable, they stop thinking about what’s best for Oklahoma. Many people are upset with the direction Oklahoma is going, but no one has as much a right to complain as do the independent voters in the state.

Oklahoma has made it extremely difficult for independent voters to make their voices heard, form their own political parties and run their own presidential candidates. We’ve not had an alternative party with an alternative presidential candidate in more than 12 years. The Legislature refuses to rectify this problem. If the current Legislature refuses to alleviate the grievances of independent voters, then those voters need to force their hand.

Independent voters need to become independent candidates for the Legislature. Only by becoming candidates for office and running against comfortably seated incumbents will we see a change in the laws blocking alternative parties and candidates. It doesn’t take much to run for office, but by doing so, we can get many issues in front of voters that the major party candidates refuse to address in public. We can become a force for change.

We really hope that Independent voters read this and our other messages and make the choice to run for office.

A copy of this letter was also published at the Tulsa World.