Blog
Filing period in SD 59 special election was hasty and illegal
by Mark Jenkins
Republicans and Democrats have often used their elected offices to encourage political participation within their party while throwing up road blocks in front of the opposing party. Whether it is drawing political boundaries that protect their own party members, closed party primaries or “unfunding” political campaign refund programs, the current two party system continues to demonstrate that your participation matters if, and only if, you support one of their parties.
The Independence Party of Minnesota has been a dedicated advocate for political reform that broadens citizen participation in our government. This week we discovered another example of blatant disregard for citizen participation.
This past Thursday Governor Mark Dayton announced his appointment of State Senator Larry Pogemiller (DFL-59 Minneapolis) to run the Minnesota Office of Higher Education. On Friday, the Governor issued a "writ of election" calling for a special election to fill Senator Pogemiller's seat. The writ specified that the filing period for candidates would only last three days and would begin the very next business day (Monday, October 31st to Wednesday, November 2nd). This timeline gave potential candidates a mere 2 days to prepare, and 3 days to file for the open seat. This is short notice even for a major party like the Independence Party. The challenges facing third party and independent candidates to file for and achieve ballot access are far greater than those affiliated with a major party. According to state law, a candidate who is not running as a member of a major political party must submit a nominating petition with 500 signatures of support (number required for state legislative races) to have his or her name placed on the general election ballot. State law also states that the candidate may only collect those signatures during the filing period. The Governor's writ left third party and independent candidates with only 3 days to collect 500 legal signatures and file them with the Secretary of State's office. As a result, there will be no third party or independent candidates on the ballot in this special election.
This abrupt and inconsiderate timing would be merely shameful if it had been executed properly. Unfortunately, this hurried procedure ended up being illegal as well. Hennepin County's Election Manager told me earlier today that the writ was received on Friday evening and officially posted on Monday morning. According to State statute 204D.22 Sub 2: "The county auditor shall post a copy of the writ in the auditor's office at least five days before the close of the time for filing affidavits of candidacy for the special election." This means that the filing period could not legally close until the end of business on Friday, and not Wednesday as was ordered by the Governor.
The Independence Party does not plan on taking any legal actions regarding this oversight, be it legal or not, however limiting to a potential candidate’s participation in the electoral process. As a major party, the Independence Party was not impacted any more than the Republican Party was. We do suspect that Democrats had earlier knowledge of the opening considering the circumstances. We also believe that a court fight would be an unnecessary waste of tax dollars and would not change the outcome of the election itself. Our belief in fair and open politics does compel us to draw people's attention to the effects of restrictive electioneering on the part of the Governor.
Because of actions like this one, and because the Independence Party platform states "that serving the interests of all the people should be a higher priority than serving the interests of a powerful few", we will continue to expose restrictive electioneering on the part of any elected official. For these same reasons, we will continue to lend our voice and our effort to real political reforms like ranked choice voting, independent redistricting efforts, and now, special election reform.
