RFK Jr.’s We the People party nominates NC candidates after denial by board of elections

RALEIGH - The North Carolina State Board of Elections will meet July 9 to review their initial denial of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s We the People party.

Third-party hopeful RFK Jr. has been petitioning for ballot access in almost all 50 states and the District of Columbia, according to his campaign website, while former president Donald Trump faces felony sentencing in September and President Joe Biden attempts to assuage calls for his stepping down from office .

During the state board of elections’ June 26 meeting, the five-person board voted to deny We the People ballot access “for now.” The three Democratic board members who voted no said the status of the party could change after further investigation into concerns over the validity of petitioners’ signatures and what volunteers told signees about the petition.

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Additional presidential third-party candidates Cornel West with the Justice for All party and Randall Terry for the Constitution party were initially denied ballot access by the state board.

The updated decision will come out past the July 1 deadline to certify petitions, but Democratic chair of the state board Alan Hirsch said if the parties are approved, he believes they will still be able to place candidates on the ballot.

With the board’s investigation pending, there’s still a chance We the People could obtain ballot access, and We the People Vice Chair Ryan Rabah said he anticipates a re-vote in his favor.

“We look forward to the Board reversing that decision very soon,” Rabah said in an email. “This is not the first time the Board has exhibited this type of behavior and this pattern and their motives are being scrutinized. These delaying tactics are a barrier to our campaigns and we want to get to the business of helping the people of North Carolina.”

The party continued business as usual holding their state convention just days after the initial denial where they nominated RFK Jr. for president, Nicole Shanahan for vice president, Jeff Scott for North Carolina Senate and Mark Ortiz for Rowan County Commissioner, Rabah said in the email.

A party-line vote

Democratic board of elections members voted no primarily over concerns about how We the People collected signatures. Did volunteers properly inform signees that they were supporting We the People becoming a party, not just RFK Jr., and not just third parties in general, board members wondered in the meeting.

After a few signees requested their names be removed from the petition, Hirsch said, it caused pause. He said those few signees could be indicative of a concerning pattern.

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Ceara Foley, chair of the We the People party who was present at the meeting, clapped back at the assertion, saying she and her staff were properly informing signers.

“There are a number of different reasons besides not given the purpose and intent of the petition that people could change their mind months later,” Foley said.

Additionally, the North Carolina Democratic Party and Elias Law Group for Clear Choice Action, a Democratic PAC, sent letters to the state board calling into question the party hopeful. Clear Choice Action said RFK Jr.’s campaign was “creating a sham political party” under We the People to obtain ballot access easier.

The letter referenced the difference in required signatures for a new party versus an unaffiliated candidate wherein it takes almost 70,000 more signatures to get on the ballot as an unaffiliated candidate than as a party.

Two Republican board members, Stacy “Four” Eggers IV and Kevin N. Lewis, voted to approve the party, both expressing frustration during the meeting.

“I don’t think it’s our responsibility to kick this down the road past the statutory deadline, to go out on a hunting expedition” for people who may want to remove their names from the petition, Lewis said.

Concerns over political motivation

From the beginning of RFK Jr.’s endeavors, Democrats in particular took issue with his run, with many saying he would pull votes from Biden, which could hurt him in a close race with Trump.

Democratic Party chair in Buncombe County Kathie Kline has been outspoken on the issue writing an opinion piece in the Asheville Citizen Times urging voters not to vote for third-party candidates .

Later, Kline said in an interview that she had concerns about how the We the People party garnered signatures, saying she and her team called petitioners to inquire. When speaking to some signees, she said they did not know it would put RFK Jr. on the ballot. It was misleading, she said.

North Carolina Republicans jumped on the decision, saying it was politically motivated.

"The State Board of Elections' majority have shown yet again there is no action too outrageous or too radical they won't make to protect Joe Biden and Democrats," said North Carolina GOP Communications Director Matt Mercer.

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Sarah Gleason is the North Carolina Election Reporting Fellow. Email her at SGleason@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: RFK Jr.’s We the People party nominates NC candidates after denial by board of elections