Maybe it should be called the Richard Painter Bill. Or the power that no one wanted.
A set of proposals filed in the Minnesota House and Senate would give the state’s political parties the authority to block some candidates from appearing on state primary ballots with party affiliation.
House File 708 and its companion Senate bill, Senate File 752, make several changes to state law governing how candidates from both major and minor political parties get on the ballot. But a new section of law would also change the current procedure for major party filing.
Currently, anyone who wants to run as a Republican or a Democratic-Farmer-Labor candidate can do so without challenge. If they get more votes in the primary than other candidates with the same party identification, they move on to the general election. Think DFLer Tim Walz, who defeated the party’s endorsed candidate, Erin Murphy, in the primary before going to win the governorship in November.
But under a provision in the bills, parties would be asked at the end of the June candidate filing period for a list of candidates that have party approval. No approval, no placement on the primary ballot. If parties don’t submit a list, all candidates who filed will be deemed to be approved.
The parties have long tried to control who can claim to be an official candidate, and this would let them keep non-endorsed candidates off the primary ballot. Yet another odd provision in the legislation might give the parties pause in using such a veto: Any candidate not approved by the party would be sent directly to the general election, where they would appear on ballots without any party identification.
Minor parties have more control over party affiliation because they qualify candidates by nominating petitions. And other aspects of the bills liberalize current rules for those minor parties, including making it easier for them to qualify candidates for legislative offices without having to compete for more expensive statewide and federal races.
But the major parties — which now include the Grassroots-Legalize Cannabis Party and the Legal Marijuana Now Party — can’t control who runs under their banner. While they can block a candidate from claiming a party endorsement, they can’t keep them off the ballot or prevent them from citing a party affiliation on that ballot.
Sponsored by Rep. Steve Elkins, DFL-Bloomington, HF708’s language is identical to that contained in Senate File 752, which is sponsored by Sen. Scott Jensen, R-Chaska, along with two other Republicans and one DFLer.
The Painter problem?
So who wants this new power? Elkins did not respond to a request for comment and a spokesman for Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon gave a somewhat cryptic statement about the legislation, saying Simon thinks “election reform proposals to expand rather than restrict ballot access are worthy of discussion.”
But is he for it or against it? No response.
A spokeswoman for state GOP Chair Jennifer Carnahan said the party had no comment, while state DFL Chair Ken Martin was surprised when he heard about the ballot access veto.
“The whole thing is goofy,” Martin said when told of the provision. “You could make an argument that it would strengthen the hand of the party, to give strength to their endorsement process, that if you’re not endorsed you’re not allowed to run in the DFL primary. But that sounds unconstitutional.”
As to the notion that all of the non-party-blessed candidates would move directly to the general election, Martin said that is, in fact, the opposite of what the party would want. “You don’t want a 50-person ballot in November,” Martin said. “The fact that I don’t know about it will tell you that this isn’t coming from anyone with any stature. It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Political parties have long wanted to protect the party “trademark” and there have been instances where candidates that don’t share party principals or who seek to do mischief attract complaints and even litigation. In Minnesota, parties frequently require candidates to promise that they will not file for the office if they don’t win endorsements at party conventions. Often, however, candidates make no such pledge and file regardless of endorsement. And often they win.
Just last election, both Walz and Republican candidate Tim Pawlenty filed under party titles even though other candidates were endorsed — Murphy by the DFL and Jeff Johnson by the GOP. Would Walz and Pawlenty really have been blocked by party officials from appearing on the primary ballot? Would the rank and file try to pressure party leaders to do so?
The most notable party-affiliation feud occurred in the midst of last year’s DFL contest for the U.S. Senate. Appointed U.S. Sen. Tina Smith was the choice of the party at the state convention in Rochester but one-time Republican Richard Painter also sought the endorsement and filed for the office in June. DFL Chair Martin dubbed Painter a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” after Painter balked at declaring himself a Democrat during an interview.
But Martin said Wednesday the last thing the DFL would have wanted was for Painter to reach the general election ballot with Smith and GOP nominee Karin Housley. Painter tallied 14 percent of the DFL primary vote and could have taken votes from Smith with his appeals to parts of the party’s environmentalist base.
“You’d probably have Karin Housley in the (U.S.) Senate,” had Painter been on the general election ballot, Martin said.
‘Access to the ballpark’
It appears the veto language was part of model legislation produced by the Libertarian Party of Minnesota five years ago and endorsed by the Independence and Green parties. But again, most of that language relates to helping minor party candidates reach the ballot, not keeping major party candidates off it.
The changes requested by the minor parties range from letting them gather signatures on standard business-sized paper rather than 8.5-by-14-inch paper to letting them collect signatures from any voter, even if they have taken part in DFL or GOP elections. It would also let them concentrate on getting candidates on the ballot for smaller offices like state Legislature without first having to qualify candidates for office like president, governor or U.S. Senate.
When asked about the veto language, Libertarian Party Chair Chris Holbrook said, “We welcome any amendments.” The Libertarians have scheduled a press conference Thursday in St. Paul with its national committee chair, Nicholas Sarwark, to support the provisions aimed at helping minor parties.
“I don’t know why any elected official would decline to talk about creating a level playing field — or at the very least, talk about allowing access to the ballpark,” said Holbrook in a statement.
“The bottom line is that voters whose views happen to align with those of minor parties are essentially being gagged, and that is just not Minnesotan. We can and must do better,” said Matt Kowalski, the Libertarian party’s executive director. “But the good news is that every time our coalition has met with an elected official about this, we have found they agree.”
Bad idea!
Political parties have rights of association and it is important that they be able to exercise those rights when appropriate. The provision bumping the booted to the Nov. ballot protects people from being booted to manipulate disputes that are within a party and can be dealt with by a primary contest. However, as a Green, I wouldn’t be okay with an avowed Nazi running in our primary or on the Nov. ballot under the Green Party banner. I do not have a right to say they can’t run period but as a member of a party with constitutional rights of association. The party should have the right to do. For Greens same with a climate change denialist, an ardent homophobe, or “a little pollution is good for you” advocate may all be candidates the party might disavow. All parties have seats in contests that go infilled somewhere in the state in a given election cycle and sometimes people. I see nothing wrong with affirming parties right’s of association while also protecting individuals rights to seek
Public office
Needed reporting. The last thing we need is to give political parties more control over the political process. Ranked choice voting would help.
Ranked choice voting is a terrible idea. The problem is that those who don’t vote for all candidates have their votes nullified. We just saw this mess in Maine I believe it was where the person who won the majority of votes wasn’t given the seat.
Even if you only vote for one candidate, your vote still counts. In Maine, the winner simply had more second place votes, namely more total support than other candidates. Sounds democratic doesn’t it? Certainly more democratic than plurality voting where someone with 37% of the vote can win the office.
The winner in Maine got a plurality of 48 percent.
The winner in Maine’s 2nd district had 45.6% on the first round, slightly less than the Republican’s 46.3%. On the second round, the Democrat had 50.6% of all ballots that expressed a preference between the two. If you include ballots that didn’t rank either the Democrat or the Republican, the Democrat had 49.2% versus the Republican’s 48.0%. The 2.8% who chose to only rank independent candidates did not have their votes “nullified” any more than if they had voted for such a candidate under the old system.
Other than maybe the paper size bit, everything about this is horrible.
Hey, it is bipartisan, got that going for it.
A bad idea, and both sides really are doing it!
This column does not provide an objective or fair account of the Ballot Access Inclusiveness Bill. Oddly, the name of the bill nor the bill numbers (HF 708 & SF 752) are provided. The bills can be found by the following link and it is good to read the actual bills: https://www.leg.state.mn.us/leg/legis. There is also information available from each minor party and the bill’s two authors.
Not only does the bill “modernize Minnesota’s statutory definitions of Major and Minor political parties, it will also bring Minnesota’s standards in-line with neighboring states and eliminates unconstitutional and outdated requirements while harmonizing various statutes.” As with other laws, North and South Dakota, Iowa and Wisconsin have updated their laws along the lines of these bills; while Minnesota lags behind.
The article gives Ken Martin, the chair of the Democratic Party, opportunity for lengthy commentary, while only one minor party is given voice. Naturally, Mr. Martin and the Democratic party have a vested interest in keeping current laws in place – no matter how outdated – to maintain their political power in the legislature. Many in both major parties want to keep independent political parties from being able to win elections.
Political processes and systems in our state need be updated and expanded. We live in a time with deep divisions and we need more voices at the table to represent the citizens of Minnesota. The bills can be amended and improved to ensure that if passed, the legislature will better represent the people.
Thanks for catching this, Peter. I’ll have an amendment drafted before the bill is heard. This is certainly not the intent.
Rep Steve Elkins.
What a simplistic view of what the ballot access inclusion bill is.
Peter Callaghan has the wrong L word. This isn’t about liberalism. This is about archaic rules that the two parties wrote for self preservation.
Our current laws create a barrier to existing and any new 3rd parties and allow the DFL and Republicans to keep pushing the spoiler narrative.
It’s ridiculous for the writer to ask, who asked for it. We had a press conference and worked hard to get this bill authored. The Greens, IP, both legalize marijuana parties, and the Libertarian party are in coalition on this.
Minnesota is one of the last 2 states holding on to this archaic law as written.
And for the DFL legislators lying they know nothing about it. I emailed you and tagged you. So far the one “progressive” response I have received tried to scold and educate me about protecting democracy and our fore fathers.
Ken Martin made mention about if he doesn’t know about it than it can’t be a thing.
As co-Chair of this party, I don’t need permission from anyone to write policy and present bill proposals. I don’t need an elected seat to have power and influence. And I certainly don’t need the Kodak business model way of thought to be touted. Ask them how that worked out for them.
Politics and small D democracy is not about exclusion. Access and equitable outcomes is what we need. Diversity and inclusion means nothing if those sitting at the table are doing the same thing as the old guard and status quo were pushing.
I sincerely hope that we can have an adult conversation as cooperators instead of trying to paint us all as loony uneducated buffoons who know nothing about how politics work. This bill can be amended as most bills that are heard, few are passed as written, so why not just work together?
We know how it works and that is exactly why this bill is important. I got cards in the mail from the Republicans I wrote to who sit on the various committees and got nothing but dead air from the DFL.
Instead of fear mongering articles, Can we get to consensus instead of using Roberts Rules to kill conversations and good policy making before it can even happen?
Additionally, no one emailed or called me about this article once again minimizing Black leadership who leads a political party. I would ask the other Black chairs to join me in solidarity, but we haven’t had that and still don’t. Oh that’s right, we are just the backbone of the mule horse. 👀✊🏾
Sincerely,
Your friendly neighborhood GP Co-Chair
The one section about the bill in which this article obsesses over the most (sect.8) has already been amended for removal, leaving the author with not much else to complain about absent the desire to just be disagreeable. Most of our neighboring states plus Canada have fair ballot access laws similar to the ones being proposed in this bill. This modest bill would do the bare minimum in promoting healthy debate and strengthen democratic integrity in our electoral process. I’m guessing those against it have never attempted to run for office as an independent and want to keep political power consolidated within the hands of the few, but we should encourage an expanded debate and more competition.