Nevada Supreme Court Removes the Green Party from the Ballot

On September 6, the Nevada Supreme Court voted 5-2 to remove the Green Party from the ballot. Nevada State Democratic Party v Nevada Green Party, 24 OC 00107.1B. The lower court had kept the party on the ballot. Here is the 18-page opinion.

When the Green Party began its petition drive, the Nevada Secretary of State furnished a sample form. But, the Nevada Secretary of State sent an incorrect version. The petition blank should have contained a sentence saying the circulator attests that, to his or her belief, all the signatures were of registered voters. The petition blank for initiatives does not have such a requirement. Furthermore the requirement that this sentence be included is not mentioned in the election law; it is only a regulation.

The court majority acknowledges that the Secretary of State’s error was responsible, and says it was an “unfortunate mistake.” The majority acknowledges that Nevada precedent says substantial compliance is good enough. As the dissent points out, the missing sentence serves no useful purpose, because all the signatures were checked anyway and there were easily enough valid signatures.

This is an especially painful blow for the Green Party, because it almost certainly would have polled enough votes for one of its nominees to keep its spot on the ballot. Furthermore the decision completely eliminates the ability of Nevada voters to cast a vote for Jill Stein, because Nevada bans write-in votes.


Comments

Nevada Supreme Court Removes the Green Party from the Ballot — 54 Comments

  1. Even though the Greens got more than TRIPLE the number of signatures? We need a court case, corrupt DemocRATs deserve to be locked up for destroying democracy like this.

  2. STANDARD ROT —

    A-N-Y THING AN EXEC HACK SAYS MAY BE WRONG

    ELECTION LAW — NOW A GIANT MAZE NEEDING THE BAN COMPUTER SYSTEM TO DECIPHER

    HOW MANY VARIABLES — 100 ??? 500 ??? MORE ???

  3. Interesting that the Secretary of State committed the error, but the Green Party of Nevada received the punishment.

    That’s some kind of upside down justice.

    I hope there is time before ballots are printed for a winning federal appeal.

    And I sincerely hope this backfires against the “Democratic” Party of Nevada.

  4. One would think that the secretary of state’s error being held responsible by the majority opinion, would then suffice to allow the petitions by exception. Or at the very least, that some form of penalty would be handed down to the secretary of state for his “unfortunate mistake”. But no.

    The plaintiff is the Democratic Party of Nevada.
    The secretary of state is a Democrat.
    The five judges who signed the majority opinion are four Democrats and one Republican.

    I’m sure that’s just a coincidence though 🙂

  5. Dumb thing I’ve ever heard. The SOS office caused the problem. The petitions were checked anyway without the language and they still get thrown off the ballot? We’re getting to Banana Republic levels.

    Democrats aren’t getting my vote this year no matter how they try to box me out from voting for my candidate.

  6. Regarding the affidavit: Is the petitioner expected to check the ID of each signer? I imagine that is the only real way for them to “believe” whether the signer is a registered voter in his/her county of residence.

    “The circulator affidavits provide a level of fraud prevention that other procedures, such as validating a sample of signatures, cannot provide.”

    Why can’t signature validation provide the same? The law permits the clerk to select only a sample for validation… does it force the clerk to use only a sample? I doubt it. This argument is weak.

    “In particular, the attestation not only attests to the fact that the signatory is a registered voter in the county, but it also attests to the fact that the signatory is a registered voter in the county of his or her residence.”

    What the hell kind of argument is this? There is only one address listed on somebody’s state ID. It is the onus of the citizen and the State to make sure the place where someone is registered to vote is the place of their residence. Petitioners cannot possibly be responsible for that.

    “Those declarations do not indicate that the circulators were asking signatories if they were a registered voter in the county of the signatory’s residence.”

    Asking someone is not how you verify! Asking someone does not fill you with the sense of “belief”! The judge permits hearsay!

    “regardless of what it received from the Secretary, the Green Party still had a duty to comply with the legal requirements for circulator affidavits, and it did not do so.”

    That’s a gray area… one could argue that the SoS waived the regulation (not a law) when they provided the wrong form. But regardless, when the State messes up like this, the applicant should have the right to remedy the situation. It sounds like some of the petitioners submitted affidavits after the fact. That should be sufficient.

  7. @AZ
    14-2: “…when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States… is denied… or in any way abridged… the basis of representation therein shall be reduced…”

    It’s pretty clear to me that not allowing write-in votes significantly abridges the right to vote, significantly more so than denying a ballot line with the candidate’s name. What have courts said about this issue? And this should have been brought up in this Nevada case. Denying the Green Party petition will result in significantly abridging the right to vote, and the Democrats would have had a stronger case if Nevada allowed for write-ins.

  8. Adam Cerini:

    You point out weak points in the law. The legislature should fix these holes by requiring that circulators of these petitions be notary publics as well as licensed attorneys admitted to the Nevada bar.

    Additionally, they should be required to attest that the signature was obtained at the signatory’s residence, which the petition circulator has examined a sufficient number of times to swear on the Communist Manifesto that it is the signatory’s primary domicile.

    Furthermore, the circulator should swear that she has examined the signatories voter registration card and drivers license or state ID, and that the addresses match, along with obtaining a fingerprint match from the police.

  9. We will work on getting these common sense amendments to the legislation passed through the legislature.

  10. Trump couldn’t even fix a wrestling match. Hell, he went broke running a casino!

  11. A.C. —–

    SCOTUS AND OTHER USELESS COURTS HAVE IGNORED/SUBVERTED 14-2 SINCE 1868 — ***UNIVERSAL*** RIGHT TO VOTE FOR A-L-L USA CITIZEN ADULT MALES- WHITE/ BLACK/ TECHNICOLOR.

    ANYBODY WITH A POLITICS BRAIN CELL IN 1865-1866 KNEW THAT THE SOUTHERN POOR WHITES [OFTEN WITH NO RIGHT TO VOTE] WERE USED AS CANNON FODDER BY THE TOP SLAVERS IN THE CONFEDS REGIME IN 1861-1865 MASS MURDER BATTLES

    TOO MANY USELESS MORON LAWYERS SINCE 1776 / 1861 / 1868 TO COUNT — ESP SUPER-USELESS LAW SKOOOL PROFS.

    LATER HACKS FAILED TO UPDATE 14-2 IN 15 / 19 / 24 / 26 AMDTS.
    —–
    NOOOO EXEC REGS RE BALLOT ACCESS/ ELECTION EQUIP / COUNTING VOTES / ETC >>> ALL ***BASIC STUFF*** IN AN ELECTION L-A-W.

    ELECTION REGS — AKIN TO NO PARKING ZONES ON WEEKENDS — MINI STUFF

  12. Let me guess. The 5 assenting judges went to Ivy League schools and the 2 dissenting judges went to community colleges?

    How do you punish the Green Party for the SoS’s mistake? This is clearly a partisan decision to help the Democrat party.

  13. “ONE PERSON NOM/ISSUE FORMS FOR BALLOT ACCESS”

    Excellent idea. It will help keep Mickey Mouse parties off the ballot.

    “How do you punish the Green Party for the SoS’s mistake?”

    Punishing the vomit clowns is always a good idea, regardless for whose mistake.

    “This is clearly a partisan decision to help the Democrat party.”

    You say that like it’s a bad thing, and it’s the Democratic Party.

  14. A.C. — BIT MORE —

    ORIGINAL 14-2 AMDT WOULD HAVE APPLIED TO ALL FED AND STATE OFFICES

    SENATE AMDT SPECIFIED MAJOR OFFICES ONLY —

    IE NOT LOCAL GOVT HACKS – LIKELY MORE IMPORTANT FOR MANY LOCAL FOLKS IN POST WAR EX-SLAVE STATES — IE COUNTY / CITY / TOWNSHIP OFFICES

    14-2 CRIME LOOPHOLE – MORE FATAL FOR BLACKS AND POOR WHITES.

  15. The only people against Trump are retards, communists, and terrorists. Real Americans support him 100!

  16. “Democrats Saving Democracy” is either an expert at dry humor and sarcasm or is deadass and is actually a shill for corrupt DemocRATs … it’s honestly hard to tell.

  17. Trump is a con artist grifter is Robert K St0ck trolling again. Richard Winger banned you for a reason. Stop evading it.

  18. This decision was deplorable, particularly given that the citizens of Nevada will now be denied the opportunity to vote for the Green Party as a result of Nevada being one of only 9 states which prohibits write-in votes.
    The prohibition of write-in votes seems, on its face, to be not only antithetical to the very concept of democracy but also to be a violation of our first amendment rights. Indeed, those very principles were raised in the case of Burdick v Takushi (504 U.S. 428) decided by the US Supreme Court in 1992 in which the court in a 6-3 decision found that the prohibition of write-in votes was not unconstitutional. The court held that with “adequate ballot access” a “State’s ban on write-in voting imposes only a limited burden on voter’s rights to make free choices and to associate politically through the vote.”
    But is there “adequate ballot access” when the fourth largest political party can be thrown off the ballot because it was “misled” by the very government department entrusted with ensuring that there be “adequate ballot access”? The fact that there is not “adequate ballot access” for third parties in this country is painfully obvious to any long-time reader of Ballot Access News. This decision by the Nevada Supreme Court just puts another nail in the coffin of “adequate ballot access”.
    Burdick v Takushi should be overturned. For a more detailed discussion of why the prohibition of write-in votes should be deemed unconstitutional see “The Right to Write-In: Voting Rights and the First Amendment” by Michele Logan in Hastings Law Journal, Vol 44, Issue 3.

  19. I can only imagine that Richard, being as old as he is, is constantly bemused by this insane comment section…

  20. Thanks Joubertmon, I ought to sit down and read these historic Supreme Court decisions one day. I’ll look for the journal article.

  21. Burdick v Takushi (504 U.S. 428)(1992) — DIRECTLY SUBVERTS 14-2 AMDT

    ONE MORE SCOTUS HACK MORON ELECTION LAW OPINION

  22. Donald Trump is the name of the Patriot who’s dreaming
    Of killing illegals and listening to them screaming!

  23. @Thecommander Jeff

    For real. Mr Winger holds what I would consider to be very progressive views on quite a few different topics. Yet this new generation and its behavior, the products of such progressive views, are a spectacle to behold for any previous generation.

    Mr Winger reading BAN comments must, in a sense, feel a lot like someone visiting a zoo which they themselves built to house their own offspring.

  24. Petitioners should double-check beforehand the work and information of public officials regarding process whenever possible. They will let you do it wrong, by mistake or even on purpose.

  25. When Trump made the announcement
    I was there at Trump Tower
    The goal is White Power
    Every month, day and hour!

  26. @joubertmon,

    Don’t partisan primaries inflict a more severe burden on speech than a ban on write-in voting?

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