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North Carolina approves party seeking to put RFK Jr. on the ballot, rejects effort for Cornel West

  • Gary D. Robertson, The Associated Press

  • Canadian Press

  • July 16, 2024

FILE - Harvard Professor Cornel West speaks at a campaign rally for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., at the Whittemore Center Arena at the University of New Hampshire, Feb. 10, 2020, in Durham, N.H. Georgia Democrats are challenging efforts to place West and three other candidates on the state's presidential ballots, part of a nationwide effort to block candidates who could siphon votes from incumbent President Joe Biden. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, File)

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- North Carolina's election board voted Tuesday to certify a political party that wants to put Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on the state's presidential ballot this fall. The panel rejected a similar petition effort by a group backing Cornel West, citing questions about how signatures were collected.

After weeks of reviewing the signature drives, the board voted 4-1 to recognize the We The People party that Kennedy, an author and environmental lawyer, is using as a vehicle to run in a handful of states. The election board decision means the party can place Kennedy on statewide ballots.

The board's Democratic majority voted 3-2 along party lines to block the Justice for All Party of North Carolina from ballots. That group is backing West, a professor and progressive activist.

We The People and Justice for All each collected enough valid signatures from registered and qualified voters. The 13,865 required are a small fraction of those needed to run as an independent candidate in North Carolina, which Kennedy initially attempted.

Board Chair Alan Hirsch, a Democrat, said that while he believed thousands of signatures turned in by Justice for All were credible, he had serious misgivings about the purpose of signature collectors unrelated to the group that also turned in petitions.

In a video presented to the board, a pro-Donald Trump activist collected signatures for West outside a Trump rally in North Carolina and said getting West on the ballot would take votes away from presumptive Democratic nominee and President Joe Biden.

Seperately, Hirsch pointed to the group People Over Party collecting signatures to support West's candidacy. He said its attorney refused to provide information sought in a board subpoena. The party's lawyer called the subpoena requests overly broad and subject to attorney-client privilege.

"I have no confidence that this was done legitimately," Hirsch said of the petition drive.

Board staff also said that of nearly 50 people contacted at random from the Justice For All petition list, many said they didn't sign the petition or didn't know what it was for.

The election board's two Republican members said both groups should have been recognized as official parties.

"Justice for All has submitted well over the number of petitions required. And if we don't approve them as a new party in the state of North Carolina based on talking to 49 people, I think that would be injustice for all," GOP member Kevin Lewis said.

Republicans and their allies have said the board's Democratic majority was trying to deny ballot access to candidates who would take away votes from Biden in the battleground state won by Trump in 2016 and 2020.

Justice for All Party of North Carolina Chair Italo Medelius said he expected the party would ask a federal judge to order its candidates be placed on the ballot.

Not including North Carolina, Kennedy's campaign has said he is officially on the ballot in nine states and has submitted signatures in 15 more. The West campaign said it has secured ballot access in nine other states, but acknowledged some certifications must still be finalized.

In some states, the drives to get West and Kennedy on ballot have been backed by secretive groups and Republican donors.