Thanks to Richard Winger of Ballot Access News for this post.
On January 21, 2016, Arizona proponents of a Top-Two Primary Initiative unveiled the language of the Initiative and began circulating the petition, which is due July, 2016.
The two problems are:
1. Party Labels - The initiative says Party labels will be on the ballot, however they wrote it to say only party labels of qualified parties and any other party would say "PND" which stands for "Party Not Determined". But the petition also says "The affiliation listed on the ballot must match the affiliation listed on the candidate's voter registration". Arizona voters are allowed to register into unqualified parties.
2. Party Labels without a Qualifier - The Supreme Court ruled in Washington State Grange v Washington State Republican Party in 2008, that Top-Two systems violates "Freedom of Association" if the ballot causes voters to believe that the party label means that the Party approves of the candidate, or that the Party nominated the candidate. That is way the states that use Top-Two system provides that the Party label has a qualifier to demonstrate that there is no true link between the candidate and the party. To handle this problem, California's label says "Party Preference: Party Name and Washington's label says "Prefers Party name". Arizona's Initiative only says Party label.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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