Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will remain on North Carolina’s ballot after a state court rejected an appeal by the North Carolina Democratic Party.
The North Carolina State Election Commission ruled last month that Kennedy’s party, the People’s Party, was qualified to vote in the state. Wake County Superior Court Judge Keith Gregory rejected an appeal of that ruling.
The state Democratic Party argued that the 4-1 vote approving ballot access violated due process and that Kennedy’s party was formed solely to circumvent stricter qualification requirements for individual candidates.
“You’ve simply asked this court to review the law and said the state board has not violated the law,” Gregory said at the end of the hearing. According to the Associated Press“I agree.”
The Democratic group Clear Choice Action filed the first complaint, arguing that “We the People should not have the right to vote.” The group sent text messages to some voters who had signed party petitions, questioning their motives and asking for an investigation into the signature process. The Raleigh News & Observer reported.
Clear Choice Action argued that We the People Party needed to submit 13,000 signatures to get on the ballot, but Kennedy alone would have needed more than 80,000 signatures.
But We the People lawyers argued that state law allows a new political party to have any purpose, even if that purpose is to elect a single candidate for president. Gregory agreed.
The state committee upheld a similar challenge last month against independent candidate Cornel West’s Justice For All party, after a group of his supporters sued the state to challenge the decision.
Kennedy claims he will have the voting power of 46 states and 329 electoral votes, but only 15 states allow him to vote, and he is already guaranteed to run in key battleground states such as Michigan, North Carolina and Nevada.
A New York state judge ruled late Monday that Kennedy’s claim that he was living in a rented room near New York City was actually a “fake” residence, denying him access to the city. The Kennedy campaign said it would appeal the decision.
