CNN
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As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. seeks to win ballot access in all 50 states, Democrats are stepping up efforts to thwart the independent presidential candidate, filing lawsuits in several states seeking to dismiss his ballot petitions.
The Democratic National Committee and Clear Choice PAC, a super PAC that supports President Joe Biden and focuses on challenging third-party candidates, challenged Kennedy’s voting rights in four states last month. Some of the challenges have been filed in key battleground states like North Carolina and Nevada, while others focus on her petitions in traditional Democratic strongholds.
Each complaint alleges that Kennedy violated state laws governing how independent candidates can gather the paperwork necessary to appear on a state’s ballot. Democrats allege that Kennedy’s campaign misled voters into signing petitions, improperly formed a sub-party to ease ballot eligibility requirements and made procedural errors in petitions across five states.
The challenge marks an intensification of a broader strategy Democrats launched earlier this year to counter Kennedy’s campaign, aiming to retain the support of voters who supported Biden in 2020 but may consider Kennedy in the November election, potentially tilting the outcome of an election expected to be decided closely.
“These assignments are important because they’re part of a two-part strategy: One, to educate voters about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” said Matt Corridoni, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee. “The second, to make sure everyone is playing by the rules.”
Speaking after an event in Albuquerque, New Mexico, last week, Kennedy rejected Democrats’ allegations and expressed confidence they could overcome the challenges.
“The challenges are meritless and every case we’ve brought to court has been easily won and will continue to be won,” Kennedy told CNN.
Ramsey Reed, campaign manager for the DNC’s third-party team, said the DNC is working with attorneys across the country to review Kennedy’s state petitions to see if they violate local petition-filing laws.
“This is a basic review to make sure the filing follows the rules, the rules that everyone else has to follow. It’s a very simple, nitty-gritty election law exercise to verify the dates, the details, the actual signatures and make sure it meets the requirements that are set out in state law,” Reed said.
The DNC formed a team to oppose third-party candidates earlier this year, around the same time as Biden’s allies formed Clear Choice. Until recently, the groups focused primarily on messaging against third-party candidates, particularly Kennedy. The DNC has frequently placed signs outside Kennedy’s campaign events calling him an “obstructionist.”
But the legal challenge raises the stakes in the campaign to block Kennedy for Democrats trying to solidify Biden’s coalition ahead of November, and more challenges are expected as independent candidates file petitions in other states.
“If there’s anywhere he’s not following the rules, we’ll be in a position to hold him accountable,” Reid said.
Kennedy’s campaign has strategically timed the signature submissions in several states to reduce the likelihood of legal challenges that, if successful, could jeopardize his access to the ballot. Kennedy, who first challenged Biden in the primary last year but then dropped the challenge and began campaigning independently, has harshly criticized Democratic opposition to his candidacy and suggested efforts to keep him off the ballot undermine the fairness of the election.
“Democrats are doing everything they can to use litigation to disenfranchise people and ensure that people can vote for the candidate they want,” Kennedy said in a March Fox News interview.
But Democrats have defended the challenges to Kennedy’s eligibility to vote as the political system working as intended. Matt Bennett, vice president of Third Way, a group allied with Biden that opposes third-party candidates, argued that Democrats have as much right to challenge Kennedy as he does to run for office.
“The No. 1 mission of a third-party campaign is to get their candidate on the ballot. If a candidate thinks he can do that, by all means, go ahead and try, but Democrats and our allies have every right to challenge that,” Bennett said. “And if he wins, he’s on the ballot. If he loses, he’s not. That’s the American system. That’s how it works.”
The DNC and Clear Choice have filed lawsuits this year challenging the voting rights petitions of other third-party candidates, including independent Cornel West and Green Party candidate Jill Stein. But Kennedy has received unusually strong support for a third-party candidate. A Fox News national poll of registered voters released Wednesday gave Kennedy 10% support, beating West and Stein, who each received 2%. In the same poll, Biden received 43% support and Trump 42%.
In a head-to-head matchup between Biden and Trump, the same Fox News poll had Biden with 50% support to Trump’s 48%. Fox News polls have a margin of error of 3%.
Kennedy is currently running in seven states – Michigan, California, Utah, Hawaii, Oklahoma, Delaware and Tennessee – and has repeatedly pledged to run in all 50 states and Washington, DC.
Ballot access is seen as a major hurdle for most independent candidates because of the time and resources required to track deadlines, follow state laws and properly file paperwork with each state. Federal campaign finance records show that Kennedy’s campaign raised $2.6 million last month but spent $6.3 million, more than double what it raised. The campaign paid about $2.7 million to Accelerate 2020 LLC, a ballot access consulting firm. A legal battle with the Democratic National Committee could put further strain on Kennedy’s resources.
The latest Democratic challenge was filed in Delaware, a Democratic-leaning state where Kennedy qualified for the Independent Party’s nomination earlier this year. The challenge, which has not been previously reported, centers on discrepancies in the timing of the party’s nomination of Kennedy and filing of paperwork with the state. In a copy of the nomination papers reviewed by CNN, the Independent Party said it nominated Kennedy and running mate Nicole Shanahan on January 23, about two months before Shanahan was announced as Kennedy’s running mate. In a letter obtained by CNN, lawyers representing the Delaware Democratic Party urged Delaware Elections Commissioner Anthony Albence to block the certification of Kennedy and Shanahan, or any Independent Party candidate in the state.
Democrats also filed a lawsuit in the key battleground state of Nevada on Friday, arguing that Kennedy is ineligible to run as an independent in that state because he accepted the nomination of a minor party in several states where he has voting rights.
Earlier this month, the Democratic National Committee helped two New York voters file a separate lawsuit with the New York State Election Commission, seeking to nullify Kennedy’s voting rights petition as “fraudulent.” The challenges allege procedural violations, including missing dates, improper page numbers and forms that were not filled out in blue or black ink.
But Democrats also claim that Kennedy campaign signature gatherers “knowingly misrepresented or concealed” the names of Kennedy and Shanahan on ballot petitions.
The allegations of voter misconduct appear to have some merit: In a separate lawsuit filed by the Kennedy campaign challenging New York state’s ballot access requirements, the independent candidate’s team admitted to hiring two New York petition firms to fold back the tops of Kennedy’s petitions to hide the names of Kennedy and Shanahan. The Kennedy campaign never turned over any of the signatures the firms collected, according to the lawsuit.
Jeffrey Weiss, a New York University professor who specializes in election law, said New York state’s unique voting access laws create obstacles, especially for third-party candidates, so some of Kennedy’s petition signatures could be invalidated.
“New York state has very specific requirements for what must be included on a petition in terms of signatures and voter addresses, so this may well be a valid claim,” Weiss said.
“New York’s election system is incredibly complicated. These laws were enacted decades ago to essentially help incumbents stay in office,” he added.
The Democratic National Committee’s efforts to block Kennedy’s right to vote are backed by Clear Choice, a PAC that has also filed a challenge in New York, focusing on questions about Kennedy’s address. The New York petition lists an address in Katonah, New York, as his place of residence, even though he is primarily based in Los Angeles. Kennedy has previously denied reports that he does not live at a residence in Katonah.
Clear Choice also filed a challenge to Kennedy’s ballot petitions in the battleground state of North Carolina earlier this month, arguing that the We the People party formed by Kennedy’s campaign is improperly circumventing state laws regulating political parties by tying itself to his campaign. Clear Choice also argues that several pages of Kennedy’s signatures could be invalidated if We the People officials mislisted their addresses.
The Kennedy campaign has already had some success in the voting rights battle in court. After Democrats opposed Kennedy’s formation of a “We the People” party in Hawaii, campaign staff defended the party at a state elections board hearing and guaranteed voting rights in the state. Kennedy campaign lawyers have filed lawsuits in several states and successfully extended petition deadlines in several states, including Utah, where Kennedy is eligible to vote.
But Democrats insist they will continue to fight Kennedy’s petition in court, further complicating his path to national voting rights. Democrats acknowledge the case illustrates the impact it could have on races in states where Kennedy actually has voting rights.
“But we’re not going to sit back and let our opponents run wild. We’ve seen in past elections what happens when we don’t take threats seriously,” Corridoni said. “We view Robert F. Kennedy’s candidacy as a threat to President Biden’s reelection.”
