Gov. Jay Inslee (D) appointed Jamila Thomas as his chief of staff on Nov. 5. Thomas succeeds former Chief of Staff David Postman, who served from December 2015 to November 2020. According to a press release, Inslee said of Thomas, “Jamila brings a deep understanding of state government. She is a strategic thinker with extensive…
Between Nov. 23 and 27, 13 states and the District of Columbia will observe election certification and/or canvassing deadlines: Nov. 23: Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Utah Nov. 24: District of Columbia, Indiana, Minnesota, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina, and Ohio Nov. 25: Alabama and Alaska Through Nov. 20, election certification and/or canvassing dates have…
A special general runoff election will be held on November 24 for District 87 in the Mississippi House of Representatives. The special general election took place on November 3, with the top two candidates advancing to the runoff. Candidates in Mississippi state legislative special elections run without party labels on the ballot. Matthew Conoly and…
Incumbent Larry Householder (R) defeated four write-in candidates—Marci McCaulay (D), Jay Conrad (R), Robert Leist (L), and Kaitlyn Clark (I)—in the general election for Ohio’s House of Representatives District 72. Householder ran unopposed in the April 28 Republican primary. On July 21, 2020, after the filing deadline for additional candidates to appear on the ballot,…
Each state has at least one supreme court, or court of last resort. Oklahoma and Texas each have two such courts, one for civil appeals and one for criminal appeals. Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship—a culmination of eight months of research and compilation of raw data—supplies Partisan Confidence Scores for 341 active state supreme court justices on all…
On November 10, 2020, State of New York Court of Appeals Justice Eugene Fahey announced his retirement from the court, scheduled for December 31, 2021, when he reaches the court’s mandatory retirement age of 70 years old. Justice Fahey joined the State of New York Court of Appeals in 2015. He was appointed to the…
The California State Commission on Judicial Appointments confirmed Martin Jenkins to the California Supreme Court on November 10, 2020. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) appointed Jenkins on October 5. Jenkins succeeds Justice Ming Chin, who retired on August 31. Jenkins is Newsom’s first appointee to the seven-member supreme court. Under California law, state supreme court justices…
A special general election was held for Virginia House of Delegates District 29 on November 3, 2020. Bill Wiley (R) defeated Irina Khanin (D), earning 63.7% of the vote to Khanin’s 36.2%. The special election was called after Chris Collins (R) resigned on June 28, 2020, to serve on the Virginia 26th Judicial District Court.…
A Ballotpedia survey of all 50 state constitutions and administrative procedure acts (APAs) revealed that 25 state APAs and constitutions specify qualifications for administrative agency leaders and the other half of the states do not specify any required qualifications as of November 2020. Administrative agency leaders are those who direct the activities of state agencies.…
Supporters of the effort to recall Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) have until November 13 to submit 631,266 signatures to require a recall election. The recall was approved for circulation by Colorado’s secretary of state on September 14. The recall effort is being organized by Lori Ann Cutunilli and Greg Merschel. Last year, Merschel was…