New Jersey requires 800 valid signatures for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties. This year the Libertarian gubernatorial petition for Ken Kaplan had 1,033 signatures, and the Peace & Freedom gubernatorial petition for Willie Araujo had 1,372 signatures. Democrats challenged the validity of both petitions, but after a court hearing, Democrats withdrew their challenges. See this story. Also, see this story on UncoveredPolitics about Araujo.
Does anyone know if this “Peace and Freedom Party” is associated with the California party? I could not tell from the articles linked to.
And the “United Front Against Austerity”, is that the Party for Socialism and Liberation?
I believe the PFP is once again branching out into a national entity, so it probably is. No idea on the UFAA.
United Front Against Austerity has a web page.
http://againstausterity.org/
The man mentioned in the Uncovered Politics article as the “intellectual guru” of the UFAA, Webster Tarpley, is former LaRouchite. Doubtful that he has anything to do with the Left.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webster_Tarpley
The New Jersey candidacy for governor under the Peace and Freedom Party banner may be related in some way to the California organization or it may be a holdover from 1988 when the Internationalist Workers Party attempted to take over the party in California by running over 90 candidates for the party’s state central committee who were illegal because they didn’t live in the districts they were running for. The IWP in ’88 put up a phony candidate for president in a few states on the east coast. This was the trotskyite, Herb Lewin. Lewin was aided and abetted by Berkeley, California’s Tom Condit who supported such phony IWP candidates as Dizon, Condiotti, Urban, and Gene Pepi.