Little-Noticed Federal Law Could Push Late Primaries Earlier

A little-noticed provision slipped into a pending Department of Defense spending bill by Chuck Schumer might have the effect of forcing states with September primaries to hold them earlier:

The provision requires that absentee ballots be mailed out to potential overseas voters at least 45 days before the general election. Although the provision’s inclusion in a Defense bill is justified by its impact on armed forces members serving overseas, it will affect all overseas voters.

The piece’s author, Eric Black, explains the effect it would have in Minnesota:

The 45-day deadline for mailing the ballots would technically fall after Minesota’s traditional primary date, but [Secretary of State Mark] Ritchie said there would not be enough time to certify the results of a primary election and get ballots printed to meet the deadline.

But Minnesota isn’t the only state with a late primary. In 2008, ten other states had primaries in September: AZ, NH, WI, VT, RI, DE, NY, MA, HI & LA. Meanwhile, FL, AK, WY & WA all had primaries in the second half of August. In other words, this provision could wind up affecting quite a few states. While Black says that MN would likely move its primary to August, others might move them even earlier.

Personally, I’ve always hated late primaries – they only serve as an incumbent protection racket. In my own state of New York, winners of contested primaries have less than two months to turn around and face an entrenched incumbent. Chuck Schumer, in fact, knows this all too well – in 1998, he had a hard-fought nominating contest against Mark Green and Geraldine Ferraro, and then managed to pull off a big upset against Al D’Amato just six weeks later. Of course, now that the shoe is on the other foot, a late primary only helps Schumer… so maybe this wasn’t even on his mind (or maybe he just thinks it’s a good idea anyway).

I’d like to see all of these states consider moving their primaries to June or thereabouts. Not only would that be the democratic thing to do, there’s always a concern about recounts. Indeed, one of the states with late primaries, Alaska, had a lengthy recount last year. Of course, as Black notes, if you have a Franken-style recount in a primary, you’re probably in trouble for the general no matter what. But at least a June election would give everyone more time. Anyhow, I’ll be very curious to see how states react to this, especially since it appears that a lot of folks don’t know this is coming down the pike.

Introducing Our Sortable Congressional Filing Deadline & Primary Calendar

Follow this link for a cool new SSP feature: a sortable calendar containing congressional filing deadlines, primary dates and run-off dates. The best part is that you can click on the column headers to re-arrange the list. So you can view things alphabetically by state, or chronologically by filing deadline or primary date.

We’ve drawn on data collected by the FEC (PDF), so it should be accurate. But if you notice anything that looks amiss, kindly let us know. Please note, though, that the SSP calendar does not contain presidential data. The FEC file does have that information, and the Green Papers does an admirable job of keeping up-to-date with the constantly shifting presidential primary calendar.

In any event, please check out our calendar and let us know if it works for you. I’ve tried it successfully in both Firefox and IE for Windows, but not on a Mac. Just make sure you have JavaScript enabled. We’ll also place a permalink to it in our new “Resources” section on the right-hand sidebar. (Look just below the “About the Site” section.)  Thanks, and enjoy!

2008 Sortable Congressional Filing Deadlines & Primary Dates

Click Column Headers to Sort

































































































































State Filing Deadline Primary Run-Off
Alabama 04/04/08 06/03/08 07/15/08
Alaska 06/02/08 08/26/08
Arizona 06/04/08 09/02/08
Arkansas 03/10/08 05/20/08 06/10/08
California 03/07/08 06/03/08
Colorado 05/29/08 08/12/08
Connecticut † 05/24/08 08/12/08
Delaware 07/25/08 09/09/08
Florida 05/02/08 08/26/08
Georgia 05/02/08 07/15/08 08/05/08
Hawaii 07/22/08 09/20/08
Idaho 03/21/08 05/27/08
Illinois 11/05/07 02/05/08
Indiana 02/22/08 05/06/08
Iowa 03/14/08 06/03/08
Kansas 06/10/08 08/05/08
Kentucky 01/29/08 05/20/08
Louisiana * 07/11/08 10/04/08 11/04/08
Maine 03/15/08 06/10/08
Maryland 12/03/07 02/12/08
Massachusetts 06/03/08 09/16/08
Michigan 05/13/08 08/05/08
Minnesota ‡ 07/15/08 09/09/08
Mississippi 01/11/08 03/11/08 04/01/08
Missouri 03/25/08 08/05/08
Montana 03/20/08 06/03/08
Nebraska 03/03/08 05/13/08
Nevada 05/16/08 08/12/08
New Hampshire 06/13/08 09/09/08
New Jersey 04/07/08 06/03/08
New Mexico 02/12/08 06/03/08
New York 07/10/08 09/09/08
North Carolina 02/29/08 05/06/08 06/24/08
North Dakota 04/11/08 06/10/08
Ohio 01/04/08 03/04/08
Oklahoma 06/04/08 07/29/08 08/26/08
Oregon 03/11/08 05/20/08
Pennsylvania 02/12/08 04/22/08
Rhode Island 06/25/08 09/09/08
South Carolina 03/31/08 06/10/08 06/24/08
South Dakota 03/25/08 06/03/08 06/17/08
Tennessee 04/03/08 08/07/08
Texas 01/02/08 03/04/08 04/08/08
Utah 03/17/08 06/24/08
Vermont 07/21/08 09/09/08
Virginia § 04/11/08 06/10/08
Washington 06/06/08 08/19/08
West Virginia 01/26/08 05/13/08
Wisconsin 07/08/08 09/09/08
Wyoming 05/30/08 08/19/08

† Connecticut’s filing deadline is fourteen days after state party conventions are held. The Democratic convention was held on May 10, 2008. The Connecticut Republican Party did not hold a statewide convention this year, but did hold individual congressional district conventions, also on May 10, 2008.

‡ Minnesota Democrats held individual congressional district conventions throughout April and May and held a state convention June 6-8, 2008. Traditionally, the party endorses candidates at these conventions. These endorsees become all-but-official nominees, usually rendering the primary a mere formality.

§ The Virginia Republican Party chose to nominate its Senate candidate via convention rather than via primary election.

* Due to Hurricane Gustav, Louisiana moved its primary from Sept. 6, 2008 to Oct. 4, 2008. Run-offs for LA-02 and LA-04 will be held on Nov. 4th and the general election for those races will be held on Dec. 6th. All other races will conduct normal general elections on Nov. 4th.

Note: Sorting by runoff date is not available.

Source: FEC.gov (PDF) (p. 3-4).