Federal Judges Order May 29 Primary Elections
The Texas political primaries will be on May 29, a panel of federal judges ordered this afternoon, and candidates can file for those elections starting tomorrow and ending on Friday, March 9.
Candidates who already filed can drop out, stand pat or switch to other races. Candidates who didn't sign up during a filing period last year can sign up now. The parties have to deliver a completed list of their candidates to the Texas Secretary of State by Monday, March 12.
The three federal judges unveiled maps for legislative and congressional elections earlier this week. Those maps won ...
Comments (2)
jimrtex
The order appears to have been written by the Republicans and Democrats with almost total disregard for independent candidates and minor parties.
Under statute, independent candidates would have had from March 7 through June 21 to collect signatures; now they have 30 days from May 30 to June 29. What is the need for the truncated collection period? A filing date in mid-August would give time to validate the signatures and prepare ballots for the general election. Who comprehends what this mean:
"The provisions of Texas Election Code § 142.009 are waived to the extent they are incompatible with this order"
Does it mean that voters in the primary may sign independent petitions; or does it simply mean that signatures can be gathered even if there is a runoff for the office sought. A good thing, considering the runoff is after the deadline for signatures.
And when are the precinct conventions for minor parties to be held? The Election Code says March 13, but the county election precincts aren't going to be realigned until March 20. The Democrats and Republicans simply discarded their precinct conventions, and moved the election for precinct chairs to the runoff on July 31 because the precincts won't be known in time to allow filing. And two weeks is pretty short notice to be organizing conventions.
Maybe the big parties think the primaries were moved last December to April 14 or 21, but the dates for convention-nominating parties are entirely separate from those for primary-nominating parties (probably why when the primary was moved in 2003 from the 2nd Tuesday in March to the first Tuesday, that the legislature forgot to change the calendar for the other parties, or give them the same flexibility in setting their conventions on a weekend.
Or maybe they think the precinct conventions will be at the time of the primary in late May.
Carolyn Moon via Texas Tribune on Facebook
South Texas screwed again.