From an article posted on Ballot Access News, on July 12, 2012:
Reportedly, national leaders of Americans Elect are planning to ask state officials to de-certify the party, in all the states in which the party is now ballot-qualified. However, there is no legal precedent that gives state or national party leaders the legal ability to take that step.
In 1986, Adlai E. Stevenson III formed the Illinois Solidarity Party, got it on the ballot, and ran as its nominee for Governor of Illinois. He polled 40%, far more than the amount needed to give the party qualified status for the next four years. He had set out at the beginning of the year to be the Democratic Party nominee for Governor, but even though he won the party’s nomination at the March primary, he resigned from the ticket and created the Illinois Solidarity Party because a supporter of Lyndon LaRouche had won the Democratic primary for Lieutenant Governor. If Stevenson had remained the Democratic nominee, he would have been forced to run as part of a joint ticket with the LaRouche supporter in November.
After the 1986 election was over, Stevenson and other Democrats who had created the party did not desire to see the Illinois Solidarity Party on the ballot in Illinois in 1988 or 1990. But, they did not believe they had the legal authority to cause the party to lose its qualified status. Instead, Democrats in the 1987 session of the legislature passed SB 10, giving the party officers the ability to end the legal existence of the party. Governor James Thompson, a Republican, vetoed the bill. The New Solidarity Party then participated in the 1988 and 1990 elections as a ballot-qualified party. In those elections, it fell under the control of New Alliance Party activists, and its 1988 presidential nominee was Lenora Fulani.
States in which Americans Elect is currently ballot-qualified are Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.
See the original article here.
@ 13 Allah be praised!
As Supreme Leader of the Arizona Americans Elect Party (and a state-certified write-in candidate for Congress in AZ-04), I have superior authority to the infidels who claim to be speaking for Americans Elect nationally. They will not get us off our ballots. We have 148 Arizona voters as registered members of our party, and Stephen Dolgos will appear on the Americans Elect primary ballot in AZ-08. We will fight this mother of all electoral battles with these people and we will win because we have God and Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett on our side. They cannot triumph against Arizona election law!
We have endorsed Green Party candidate Bill Maher for the Arizona House of Representatives in the district in which I live in Apache Junction, and we expect to be endorsing all the Green Party candidates in which no Americans Elect Party candidates are on the ballot.
Until at least 2014, the Americans Elect Party is an official party — like the Democrats, Republicans, Greens and Libertarians — in the Grand Canyon State.
Exactly 🙂
I love wikipedia’s disambiguation feature for acronyms (CDO, in this case).
@10
An individual who has consumed excess chlordiazepoxide may display some of the following symptoms:
Somnolence (difficulty staying awake)
Mental confusion
Coma
Sounds like the effect of AE on voters.
@4
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlordiazepoxide
?
🙂
(Kidding; I know what you mean).
I think AE is more analogous to the Reform Party than to the Greens.
Both AE and Reform advocate no clear ideology or agenda. Instead, they promote “good government” and “common sense solutions” and claim to be anti-extremist and anti-special interests.
Vague and squishy concepts that mean different things to different people. Not the sort of things you can build a party on, since sooner or later, you must take specific positions on contentious issues. And then you lose supporters who imagined you were on their side, but aren’t.
Multiple Greens have reached out to Americans Elect to attempt to form an alliance. I am one of them. This goes back at least 2005. The book “A force more powerful” about the power of nonviolence to effect positive political change is the very message, and life’s work of Green Party founder Petra Kelly. I remain hopeful Americans Elect will work with the Green Party. It is the smart thing to do for America.
#4 One of the best comments ever on IPR!
Making the ballot with our own line is contingent on a lawsuit at this point. Richard Winger tells me it has a good chance, but multiple other sources who I would think would know think it is a hail mary pass.
My understanding is that AE controls its state lines tightly, with the party chairs listed being AE and/or Arno employees, although it seems to have gotten away from them in Arizona; I’m not sure whether that is due to something in AZ law, a glitch in the paperwork, or something that can be duplicated in other states.
AE seems to be unwilling to budge on its decision, so it seems there will be no gift or sale of the Oklahoma line or any others.
Any word on what happens to their ballot line in Oklahoma? I remember there was some chatter on here about the Johnson campaign possibly buying it. Could that really happen, or could someone take over the shell of the party and use it for their own purpose, a la Connecticut for Lieberman? And is that easier than making the ballot with out party affiliation?
Kyle,
Americans Elect appears to be the first CDO-grade political party in history.
George
“Wonder how the people who donated $50, $100 feel about all that.”
Screwed?
Like I said when it was apparent AE wasn’t going to nominate anyone, AE just became the first investment grade political party in history. Donate large amounts of money and receive principle with interest a year later. Not too shabby.
Wonder how the people who donated $50, $100 feel about all that.
It would serve the bastards right if the party mechanism they created took on a life of its own.