Michigan Appeals Primary Date Decision To State Supreme Court

We're still no closer to knowing when (or if) Michigan will hold their presidential primary in January. Today, the state's attorney general asked the state supreme court to let the state, for heaven's sake, keep its Jan. 15 primary law. A lower-court judge invalidated the primary because the state parties wouldn't have share information about who voted and in what primary.

To make Jan. 15 work, the state says it needs to send out absentee ballots by Dec. 1. And, of course, NH Sec/State Bill Gardner is waiting to see what Michigan does before he schedules the New Hampshire Primary.

Republican legislators seem more willing than Democratic legislators to try their hand at a new law. Why? Dems in particular worry that the elections will be used to collect signatures for recall petitions in light of the state's historic tax hike. If, say, 2 million Michiganders show up on Jan. 15, it'll be much easier to collect recall signatures by district. Once the petititon is initiated, the collectors need 10,000 signatures per district and have 90 days to complete the task.

Remember: if there's no agreement, the GOP will hold a convention on Jan. 25-26, and Dems will hold a caucus at a date TBA.