Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Kentucky Bill to Move Presidential Primary to August Appears to Have Died in Committee

Richard Winger at Ballot Access News is reporting that the Kentucky Senate bill (SB 4) that would have moved the commonwealth's presidential primary from May to August has died in the House Committee on Elections, Constitutional Amendments and Intergovernmental Affairs. The meeting considering several bills yesterday was the last meeting the committee is to have had before the legislature wraps up its business and adjourns on March 22. And while the bill was finally referred to committee last week, it never received a public hearing on the House side.

That the measure ultimately ended up bottled up in committee in the House as FHQ discussed last month should probably not come as that much of a surprise. The bill passed the Republican-controlled Senate three days into the legislative session on a party-line vote. Twenty Republicans and one independent senator voted for the bill while the 14 Democrats voted against it. Once the bill was transmitted to the Democratic-controlled House, the outcome was fairly obvious if viewed through a partisan lens.

NOTE: FHQ will leave SB 4 in the Presidential Primary Bills Before State Legislatures section in the left sidebar classified as it is now. It may or may not be deemed "Died in Committee" until the legislature adjourns later this month. If the bill status on the Kentucky legislature's website changes before that time, the sidebar items will be changed to reflect that.


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