On January 25, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ordered Carl Romanelli to pay $80,408 within 30 days. Since Romanelli has very few assets, the order also makes Romanelli’s attorney, Larry Otter, equally liable for the money.
Carl Romanelli was the Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate last year from Pennsylvania. In Pennsylvania, petitions are assumed to be valid, unless someone challenges them. Democrats challenged Romanelli’s petition. The Pennsylvania challenge procedure is handled by courts, not elections administrators, so Romanelli is being billed $48,285 in fees for Democratic Party attorneys, $25,481 in court costs, $5,141 in copying and stenography fees and $1,500 for handwriting experts. Romanelli had submitted 95,000 signatures to meet a requirement of 67,070, but only 58,000 of those signatures were considered valid. He will appeal this decision to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. He also has an appeal pending in the U.S. Supreme Court over the procedures used for checking signatures in the challenge process.
Chilling! If this is upheld I can see no reason why anyone would ever think of running for statewide office in Pennsylvania as an independent candidate or alternative party nominee. The risk would just not justify the potential result.
This is unconscionable. First, a state sets prohibitive hurdles for third party ballot access clearly intending those hurdles to have a chilling effect on third parties even attempting to attain ballot access. Then if a third party candidate goes to the time and expense of attempting to surmount those hurdles and in good faith submits 50% more signatures than required, the state mandates a challenge procedure that can result in the third party candidate being liable for the entire costs of the challenge. Talk about a chilling effect. Why not just declare third parties illegal.
The Democrats have no doubt combed thru all the election laws to determine in how many states they can skewer the Green Party in this manner.
Is the PA decision posted online? I am trying to find a copy of the decision. I have googled the case and searched the PA court system website and other several legal websites and haven’t found the decision so far.
Your site has made me smile 🙂