[LPIL - Board of Directors] For Discussion in Tue, Apr 18 LPIL Board Meeting--Proposed Ballot Access Legislation

Tue Apr 18 17:46:58 EDT 2023

Senator or Representative XXXX:

I am writing to ask for changes to Illinois ballot access laws to make 
it easier for Third Party and Independent candidates for public office 
to appear on the ballot.  I hope that at least some of these changes 
proposed below can be considered for the omnibus election legislation 
still being written this session.

Illinois has some of the most restrictive ballot access laws in this 
nation.  This can easily be seen by looking at the 2022 General Election 
results.  While it is true that the Libertarian Party was able to place 
a slate of statewide candidates on the ballot, there were 118 Illinois 
House and 59 Illinois Senate district elections, none of which had a 
Third Party or Independent candidate on the ballot.  While there was one 
Third Party and one Independent candidate on the ballot among the 17 US 
House district elections, I do not know if they made the ballot because 
they gathered a sufficient number of signatures or because they were not 
challenged.

Illinois has the second most difficult petitioning requirement in the 
nation for US House elections.  Except in years that end with the number 
“2,” the signature requirement for Independent and Third Party 
candidates for US House is 5% of the total votes for that office in the 
previous election.  Only Georgia has a tougher requirement, which is 5% 
of the number of registered voters in that district.  In years that end 
with the number “2,” the requirements are 5,000 valid signatures for US 
House, 3,000 valid signatures for Illinois Senate, and 1,500 valid 
signatures for Illinois House.

Illinois also has a 5% of the total last vote petition requirement for 
Third Party and Independent candidates for Illinois House and Illinois 
Senate.  Attached please find an Excel spreadsheet that calculates how 
many signatures will be needed to get on the ballot for 2024 US House, 
Illinois House and Illinois Senate elections.  On average, it will take 
about 12,000 valid signatures to be gathered within 90 days in highly 
gerrymandered congressional districts to place a non-R, non-D US House 
candidate on the 2024 ballot.  To get that many valid signatures means 
that it will take 18,000+ total signatures to get just one US House 
candidate on the ballot.  It will take an average of about 1,600 valid 
signatures to get on the ballot for Illinois House, and about 3,000 
valid signatures to get on the ballot for Illinois Senate in highly 
gerrymandered districts.

If a non-R, non-D party wanted to run candidates for all US House, 
Illinois House and Illinois Senate districts in 2024, it would take at 
least 675,000 total signatures to get those candidates on the ballot.  
Include a statewide petition to put a presidential ticket on the ballot, 
and that number will increase to over 700,000 total signatures.

The petitioning requirement for 2026 will be even higher due to more 
people voting in the presidential election year of 2024.

Here are the changes that should be made to Illinois election law:

#1:  Substantially reduce the number of required signatures for 
candidates to get on the ballot.  I will address that with more 
specificity below.

#2:  Allow a period for petitioning longer than the current 90 days, 
which generally runs from late March to late June, along with a later 
deadline for petitioning.

#3:  Eliminate the law that states that voters can sign only one 
petition for a given office for the general election.

#4:  Eliminate the law that bars petitioners from petitioning for the 
candidates of more than one political party.  The fact of the matter is 
that most petitioning is done by professional petitioners.  This law is 
in place simply to make it relatively difficult for non-R, non-D 
candidates to get on the general election ballot, because the best paid 
petitioners petition for R & D candidates in the primary, after which 
they are legally barred from petitioning for non-R, non-D candidates to 
get on the ballot for the General Election.

#5:  End the petition challenge process and have petition signatures 
verified by State Board of Elections employees.  This is what is done in 
the vast majority of states.  The petition challenge process is a 
Kafkaesque process by which challengers attempt to terrorize, through 
large expenses and big hassles, potential candidates off the ballot.  It 
is a political sport to try to kick candidates off the ballot (including 
Primary election ballots) in Illinois, and that should stop.

#6:  Create a party petition process.  Illinois only has candidate 
petitions.  Illinois is one of eleven (11) states that does not have a 
party petition process, whereby signatures are gathered to allow a 
political party to place their candidates on the ballot before those 
candidates are selected.  Neighboring states Missouri and Wisconsin have 
party petitions with only a 10,000 valid signature requirement that then 
allows a political party to place candidates on the ballot for any and 
all offices in that state.

#7:  Reduce the ballot access retention requirement.  Illinois law 
requires getting 5% of the vote for Governor for a political party to 
become a fully recognized political party.  The median vote retention 
requirement among all the states is 2%, and that usually applies to any 
statewide office.

#8:  Allow changed petition language that does not imply that signers 
are part of the political party formation process.  It is my 
understanding that Illinois law requires such language.  Petition 
language should be clear that the petition signer is just signing to 
allow a political party or a candidate to appear on the ballot.

#9:  Allow multiple turn-ins of petitions to the State Board of 
Elections, with validity percentage feedback from the State Board of 
Elections.  It is my understanding that current Illinois law allows only 
one petition turn-in, which often makes parties and candidates gather 
far more signatures than needed to get on the ballot and generally makes 
the petitioning process more difficult and uncertain.

Attached please find an article on model ballot access legislation from 
the Harvard Journal on Legislation from 1999.  While the article is 24 
years old, and some of the information in it is dated (e.g., paid 
petitioning is much more expensive than $2 per signature these days), 
the recommendations for ballot access legislation are still appropriate.

In summary, the model ballot access legislation calls for:

A:  A party petition that qualifies a political party to place a 
candidate on the ballot for all offices in a state by gathering the 
signatures of 0.1% of the registered voters of that state between 
January 1 and August 15 of that election year; and

B:  A candidate petition (for Third Party or Independent candidates) 
that qualifies them for the ballot by gathering the signatures of 0.1% 
of the registered voters in their district between January 1 and August 
15 of that election year; and

C:  A political party that qualifies for the ballot by having 0.05% of 
the registered voters in that state registered with that political 
party, as per the description in the Harvard model ballot access 
legislation (although this would not be applicable to Illinois unless 
party voter registration is enacted in Illinois); and

D:  A political party qualifies for the ballot if any statewide 
candidate in either of the two previous statewide elections earns at 
least 1% of the vote, and, if that does not occur, a political party can 
place a district candidate on the ballot if its candidate earned at 
least 1% of the vote in that district’s election in either of the last 
two General Elections.

It is my understanding that there is an omnibus election bill being 
considered in the Illinois legislature this session.  I respectfully 
request you to sponsor and vote for legislation incorporating A, B & D 
above, or to work to have it included in the omnibus election 
legislation.

Please let me know if you are willing to work for ballot access relief 
in Illinois.

Thank you very much.

Bill Redpath

1303 Westley Lane

West Dundee, IL. 60118-3545

(703) 864-2132 (cell)

wredpath2 at yahoo.com
Chair, Libertarian Party of Illinois

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