On September 16, the New York State Board of Elections met and determined whether various petitions for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, should be determined valid.  In New York, the Board disqualifies such petitions even if no one challenges, if the petitions on their face lack any possibility of containing enough valid signatures.

The only statewide petition invalidated by the Board was the petition of Sam Sloan, who is a Libertarian but who is not the party’s nominee.  He had nevertheless submitted a petition with his own name and the party label “Libertarian”, but it did not contain 15,000 signatures.

Therefore, these parties will be on the ballot for statewide office:  the five qualified parties (Democratic, Republican, Independence, Conservative, Working Families), followed by these parties:  Anti-Prohibition, Freedom, Green, Libertarian, Rent is 2 Damn High, Tea, and Taxpayers.  Although the Taxpayers Party is on the ballot now, a lawsuit is pending on whether that petition is valid.  The Taxpayers nominee for Governor is Carl Paladino, who is also the Republican nominee.

The Tea Party gubernatorial nominee is Steven Cohn, an attorney from Long Island.  His petition had been challenged by allies of Carl Paladino, but the Tea Party petition survived.  Cohn is supported by Bobby Kumar, who has been active in the Independence Party and who briefly held himself out last year as national chair of the Reform Party.

The Freedom Party gubernatorial nominee is Charles Barron, who is angry with the Democratic Party because all six of the Democratic Party’s statewide nominees this year are non-Hispanic whites.

In 2006, when New York last held a gubernatorial election, nine parties had statewide nominees.  When there are more than eight parties, New York puts two parties in the same party column.  In 2006, the Rent is Too Damn High Party and the Socialist Workers Party were squeezed into the same column.  This year, all six or seven of the unqualified parties will be squeezed into columns that contain two parties.  If there are twelve parties on the ballot, that will be the most crowded general election for statewide office in New York’s history.  However, even if there are twelve parties on, there would only be nine gubernatorial candidates on, because the Independence and Working Families Parties are cross-endorsing the Democratic nominee, and the Taxpayers Party is cross-endorsing the Republican nominee.