Americans Elect Progress in North Carolina and Among Dems

AMERICANS ELECT

• 3rd party nearly on N.C. ballot - Americans Elect will pick its nonpartisan candidate online. (By Jim Morrill, Charlotte Observer) A state elections official says Americans Elect appears to have the required signatures to get on the November ballot alongside President Barack Obama and the Republican and Libertarian nominees. The state could certify them in early March.
• Prominent Democrat Endorses Third-Party Group (By MICHAEL D. SHEAR, NY Times/ The Caucus) “The country is going to really be in deep trouble if we don’t act soon,” Mr. Boren, who is now president of the University of Oklahoma, said in an interview with The Caucus. “I think this is really a cry from many of us who are really concerned for the future of the country.”
• Third-Party Group Wants Internet to Pick Presidential Candidate: Americans Elect, backed by $5 million from the head of a private investment firm, wants to shake up the two-party system (Rebekah Metzler U.S. News & World Report in Chicago Tribune) "There's really only been one successful third party, and that was the Republican party that came about in the wake and collapse of the old Whig party over the issue of slavery," Smith says. "Good government is not really the kind of an issue that is going to motivate people to drop long-standing ties to the party of their birth, so to speak, and take up with another party that isn't really a party."

Reform Party Going for Utah Ballot, Independents Speak Out

INDEPENDENT CANDIDATES, PARTIES AND MOVEMENTS

• Group circulating petitions to get Reform Party on the Utah ballot (By Nkoyo Iyamba, Deseret News) "When Ross Perot ran in 1992, there were two states that he came in second in the polls," said state party organizer Jaime Dives. "One of those states was Maine and the other state was Utah." Dives is circulating petitions to get the Reform Party on the Utah ballot for the 2012 election cycle. She needs 2,000 signatures from registered voters by Feb. 15.
• Political parties challenged to race to register voters (By Lee Davidson, The Salt Lake Tribune) While Republicans and Democrats already have said they plan major voter registration drives this year, Randy Miller, president of the Utah League of Independent Voters, appeared at the news conference to say his group also will push to register more people as unaffiliated voters.
• Libertarian Party of Florida hosting major Presidential Debate in Orlando (Karl Dickey, West Palm Beach Libertarian Examiner) The Libertarian Party is the third largest and fastest growing political party in the US, and is influential in both the Tea Party and Occupy movements due to their strong fiscal conservative positions and socially liberal views.   Polling data indicates that as many as 60% of independent voters consider themselves, “fiscally conservative and socially liberal.”

Americans Elect Has 1.9 Million Signatures for Presidential Ballot

AMERICANS ELECT
Nonpartisan group offers US political alternative (By Patricia Zengerle, Reuters) So far, Americans Elect has gathered more than 1.9 million signatures in support of its petition to get on the ballot in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., and raised almost $22 million. "There is a huge receptivity across the board to an independent candidate," Douglas Schoen, Americans Elect's chief strategist, a former adviser to politicians including President Bill Clinton and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, told a news conference.

2012
LISTEN: US Wants a 3rd Party Option, but Can't Name a Candidate (Martin Di Caro, WMAL.com) In interviews with WMAL.com, people in downtown DC said they would like a third option come next November, even if they could not name an individual they would like to see run as an Independent.

Americans Elect On Track for Ballot Access Across the Country, 1.9 million signatures collected so far

AMERICANS ELECT:
Nonpartisan group has Plan B for picking president (NANCY BENAC, Associated Press, San Antonio Express News) Americans Elect, whose slogan is "pick a president, not a party," appears to be on track to secure ballot access across the country, with 1.9 million signatures collected so far. But how it will affect the 2012 race depends on what kind of candidate its delegates select in next June's online convention, which will be open to any registered voter... Getting on the ballot in all 50 states isn't all that unusual: The New Alliance Party's Lenora Fulani did in 1988. The Libertarians have done it multiple times. But none of them garnered a big share of the vote.

Efforts Underway in at Least Six States to Lobby for Better Ballot Access Laws in 2012

BALLOT ACCESS
Efforts Underway in at Least Six States to Lobby for Better Ballot Access Laws in 2012 (Ballot Access News) In New York, Harry Kresky has been diligently working for a bill to replace mandatory petitions for candidate ballot access with filing fees. Kresky is chair of the election law committee of the New York County Lawyers Association. That association, as well as the New York City Bar Association, has already approved the idea. Now the work will begin to persuade the State Bar Association, and then to find a sponsor in the legislature.

Democrat Files Petition Challenge Against Independent for Philadelphia City Council Seat

PHILADELPHIA
Cindy Bass files petition challenge against Jim Foster (By Alan Tu, WHYY NewsWorks) All three candidates are running for Councilwoman Donna Reed Mlller's seat. Miller is not running for re-election.

Improved Ballot Access for Third Parties in Tennessee

THIRD PARTY BALLOT ACCESS
Green Party, Constitution Party sue over TN ballot access - New law doesn't address judge's concern of stringent rules, they say (Written by Chas Sisk, The Tennessean) That indicates the requirements are too stringent, U.S. District Judge William J. Haynes Jr. said in a decision released last September. He ordered state lawmakers to pass a new ballot-access law. The legislature did so in May, passing a bill with broad support from Democrats and Republicans. The law removed the requirement that signers declare themselves to be party members, and it gave parties about 15 more days to gather signatures.