With less than a month to collect signatures in Nevada, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. submitted a new proposal for the office of Secretary of State of Nevada, although he had previously filed a lawsuit against the office in an effort to secure a place in the state. ballot paper.
Independent candidates file a lawsuit told the Nevada office last week, two months after learning that the campaign’s collection of more than 15,000 signatures in the state would be invalid because the petition distributed to voters did not list the choice of vice president, which is required by state law for ballot access. Now, Kennedy has filed an amended petition, noting his running mate Nicole Shanahan, that the lawsuit filed by the campaign did not result in a victory for Kennedy.
While being an employee in the office wrongly informed Kennedy campaign in March that did not need the choice of vice president in the proposal, the office maintained that the campaign received clear guidelines for access to the ballot in a memo the same month.
The Kennedy campaign claimed that the Democratic Party was creating new rules to revoke his signature in Nevada, and in an email to his office on Friday, Paul Rossi, the Kennedy campaign’s lead election access attorney, said, “SOS has reversed its position. .”
However, Nevada has required an independent candidate to name a vice presidential candidate on a petition since 1993.
“Because of the SOS action, I want and expect this to be approved today” if “the federal lawsuit does not quickly produce the desired order against the new position of the secretary regarding the name of the VP in the petition,” Rossi wrote in an email afterwards. filed an amended petition.
The Kennedy campaign has until July 5 to submit new signatures to the office, which can be collected using an amended petition that now includes Shanahan’s name, the office told Rossi on Friday.
With less than a month left, the campaign will be able to collect approximately 10,000 new signatures in Nevada as the lawsuit continues.
Michael Arno, who runs a petition signature gathering company and has worked on ballot access for various independent candidates and the Ora Labels effort, said gathering a large number of signatures and more in a time frame that should be “very easy.”
Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar previously stated that his office was prepared to face Kennedy in court.
“Nevada has a rich history of independent and third-party candidates for office. Each of these candidates can get access to the ballot by following the law. We hope to see Mr. Kennedy’s team in court,” said Aguilar in a statement to CBS News last week.
As Kennedy scrambles to gain ballot access in Nevada, some Democratic Party leaders worry that he could siphon off votes from President Biden in the key battleground state. Mr. Biden won Nevada by more than 30,000 votes in 2020 against former President Donald Trump.
Somos PAC, a Latino-focused political organization, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Nevada to intervene in the Kennedy campaign’s lawsuit.
“Ballot access laws are an important pillar of our community and our democracy that protects voters and ensures that they know who they’re asking to be on their ballot in November. If the RFK Jr. campaign’s effort to collect signatures and go through the appropriate channels to include on the ballot while there is still time,” said Melissa Morales, president and founder of Somos PAC.
Supporters of the late Harry Reid, former leader of the majority of the Democratic Senate and a native of Nevada, have turned their attention to Kennedy, and hope to slow down efforts in the country through door-knocking.
Reid, who died in 2021, was known for his political organization and voter mobilization, and his coalition of voters, known as the “Reid Machine,” played a key role in securing several Democratic victories across the country, including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s win in 2016 Democratic presidential primary in Nevada.
“Does anyone know why RFK is running for president? This is the definition of a meaningless race that could have serious consequences for the country,” said Kristin Ramos, a former adviser to Reid. “Nevada should win the state for two campaigns, and it’s hard to say now that RFK is playing spoiler for.”
