Donny Ferguson has left his position as Director of Communications for the national Libertarian Party after eight months. This is the latest big staff change for the LP this summer, following the arrival of new Executive Director Wes Benedict and the departure of Director of Outreach and Affiliate Relations Austin Petersen to take a post [...]

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This post is being created in order to permit the ongoing debate over petitioning controversies to continue uncensored without mucking up unrelated topic threads. Please move all such discussion here.

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In case you were doubting it, here’s a video of Reverend Billy and his volunteers delivering petitions with over 18,000 signatures to the New York City Board of Elections. He is running as the Green Party’s candidate for mayor of New York.

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San Diego Green Party activist Rocky Neptun has issued a 2,200-word “Open Challenge to San Diego Green Party Members“. He writes in part, “I challenge you to forget our nice yuppie environmentalist image, John Muir in Birkenstocks, put away those pretensious (sic) Phd. monikers and all that rhetorical chatter, and get down-right scrappy. We cannot [...]

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WKOWTV.com of Madison, Wisconsin, reports that the Constitution Party has selected Michael Krsiean as its 2010 candidate for the state’s Third District U.S. House seat. Krsiean said in a statement, “The American people are trapped by self-serving politicians who refuse to hold the federal government within the confines of the constitutionally mandated limits.”

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Christopher Daggett is an independent candidate for Governor of New Jersey. Daggett is suggesting a 33% tax on a candidates’ who raise more than twice the amount at which publicly-financed candidates are capped. The receipts would then be distributed to the other candidates proportional to how much they raised. The proposal is based on Major League Baseball’s policy on teams that outspend a pre-set cap

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An article about the line-up in the Suffolk County elections, highlighting races with third party and independent candidates.

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Chuck Baldwin, the 2008 Constitution Party presidential nominee, appeared in Del City, Oklahoma, last week in support of Randy Brogdon, a Republican state senator running for governor in 2010. According to the Tulsa Beacon, Baldwin said, “It’s important to support men like State Sen. Randy Brogdon, who is running for governor. His election could change [...]

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Reason.tv has a seven-minute interview with Libertarian presidential hopeful Wayne Allyn Root. Reason magazine Editor in Chief Matt Welch sat down with Root at Freedomfest in July.

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On its website, the Libertarian Party is conducting a poll on possible slogans for the 2010 Libertarian National Convention, to be held in St. Louis, Missouri, May 28-31. The options: “Don’t Tread on Me” “Gateway to Freedom” “Gateway to Liberty” “Legalize Prosperity” “Show Me Freedom” None of the above

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Former New Mexico Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron served three four-year terms as Secretary of State. She was elected in 1986, 1998, and 2002. She is a Democrat. She made some rulings that were hostile to minor parties, with specific incidents related to the Green Party and the Libertarian Party. On August 19, an indictment was made public, charging Vigil-Giron with fraud, money laundering, tax fraud, attempts to evade or defeat tax, making/permitting false public vouchers, soliciting/receiving an illegal kickback, offering/paying an illegal kickback, and tampering with evidence.

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Elizabeth Benjamin reports on all the candidates who filed in person, on time, for Mayor of New York City. It appears that the Libertarian mayor candidate hopeful has not filed (although petitions could still arrived that were mailed by the deadline.) Filing so far are: Reverend Billy Talen, Green Party; Jimmy McMillan, the Rent is Too Damn High Party; Alan S. Chusid, Messianic Party; and Mayor Bloomberg, on the “Jobs and Education” line (though, Bloomberg also petitioned for the Republican and Independence Party lines.

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The Working Families Party is an automatic-ballot-status party in New York State, which often gives its ballot line to candidates already on the Democratic or Republican Party lines. A recent review of the Party’s expenditures over the last decade which were reported as rent shows an erratic pattern of payments made to several different landlords, and none marked as going directly to Flatbush Fulton Realty Associates, the owner of its current space at 2 Nevins Street in Brooklyn. Some years, the WFP appears to have paid no rent at all, based on the data filed with the Board of Elections.

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Stewart Alexander, the 2008 Socialist Party USA vice presidential nominee and an activist in California’s Peace and Freedom Party, writes at Bay Area Indymedia that the “leadership within the Peace and Freedom Party wants a measure to support same-sex marriage on the ballot in 2010.” He writes, “There is a strategic and political risk in [...]

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Tennessee’s Shelbyville Times-Gazette profiles Chris Brown, a Constitution Party member running for the 62nd District Tennessee House of Representatives seat in an election to be held on October 13. Because of difficult ballot access laws for minor parties, Brown will be listed on the ballot as an independent. Brown said, “Third party candidates almost never [...]

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13WHAM.com of Rochester, New York, reports that Alex White, “an independent endorsed by the Green Party,” has entered the race for mayor of that city. He “vows to return to community policing and eliminate all police overtime. He says he would further reduce costs by naming fewer political appointees and by creating a public electric [...]

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The Socialist Equality Party issued a statement criticizing Detroit Mayor David Bing for calling on “the city’s 13,000 employees to accept pay cuts of 10 to 20 percent through furloughs and workweek reductions.” The SEP said, “The demands of this multimillionaire businessman for ‘sacrifice’ from workers should be rejected with contempt. Bing has no popular [...]

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Reverend Billy Talen is running for Mayor of New York City with the Green Party. This afternoon, the campaign filed 18,395 signatures. Only 7,500 signatures were required.

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The New York City Board of Elections has printed absentee ballots in City Councilman Alan Gerson’s race that do not include Gerson’s name. This, despite the fact that last week the New York Supreme Court ordered him restored to the ballot. The NYC BOE absentee ballot policy violates what the U.S. Supreme Court said in American Party of Texas v White.

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For potential candidates in New York State, tomorrow, Tuesday, August 18, 2009, is the last day to file in person (or mail) an “independent nominating petition” to run for office in November.

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