On December 9, some leaders of the American Independent Party, and independent presidential candidate Rocky De La Fuente, filed a lawsuit in state court in Sacramento, charging that the Secretary of State broke several election laws, and asking for a court order that in the future, he and his successors follow the election laws. De La Fuente v Padilla, Superior Court, Sacramento.
Rocky De La Fuente asks for an order that in the future, write-in presidential candidates not be rejected just because some of their presidential elector candidates list addresses on their declaration of candidacy forms that are different than the registration addresses.
Leaders of the American Independent Party ask for an order that, in the future, Secretaries of State not accept presidential elector candidates who do not meet the constitutional qualifications to serve as presidential electors. The Complaint charges that the Secretary of State accepted a Republican presidential elector who holds an office of trust or profit with the United States.
Section 7300 of the California election code specifies that certain particular Republican “nominees” will always become Republican presidential electors (for example, the Republican nominees for Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Treasurer, Controller, Attorney General, and Secretary of State), and that this law was ignored. Of course, the law is obsolete, because no party any longer has nominees for those offices.
The complaint and the papers to be filed in the future will attempt to show that the Republican Party was late with its list of electors. The lawsuit argues that in the future, the deadline must be enforced.
The AIP also asks that future ballots tell the voters that they are voting for presidential electors, not just for president and vice-president. The Complaint points out that Sacramento County ballots did tell the voters that they are voting for presidential electors, but no other counties did that.
The AIP argues that it was illegal for the ballots in many counties to list abbreviate the party’s name as simply “AI”.
Here is the Complaint.
Bottom of Page 2 should be: “Central Committee of …”
When I open the document in Word, Word appears to be spell-checking items 27-32 in Spanish.
Where is that Model Election Law ??? — for mere humans to use in having Democracy elections —
and NOT elections for the HACK oligarchs.
It’s interesting that they include the ineligible GOP elector (which is worth calling SecState out on and demanding it not be done again)…. but don’t touch on the problem of SecState certifying 108 Trump/Pence elector candidates for 55 seats.
Markham Robinson, why isn’t the AIP pursuing it’s own action specifically regarding the fact that 108 electors were certified for Trump? I realize it’s less of an issue with Trump winning, but it seems to me you’d have the opportunity to seek a court ruling preventing Padilla from certifying the results.
Andy Craig,
57 of the 58 County ROV did not inform the voters on the
ballots in California that by voting a party they were voting for a slate of 55 Presidential Electors as required in CA Elections Code 13205. Therefore what then follows is the penality in CA Elections Code 13200, viz.,
note allowing the casting or counting of those ballots.
Chris Powell,
First a note to Andy, I did a typo above. The word should be “not”.
The most important concern is Professor A. K. B. who
holds an Office of Trust under the United States until July 14, 2018. GOP Chairman Brulte should have filed a proper and timely list by 5:00 O’clock P.M. on September
30, 1016. He filed Late on October 3, 2016 after a the AIP filed a list of 55 elector for Trump/Pence.
Mark Seidenberg,Vice Chairman. AIP of CA
I did a typo against the year is 2016 not 1016.
Richard Winger,
You stated that CA Elections Code 7300 is obsolete. That must be false, because of CA Elections Code 8811.
Richard Winger,
What is your source of the claim that CA Elections Code 7300 is an “obsolete statute”? I could not find a case making such a judicial abrogation.
Having a potential conflict between two slates of electors is no laughing matter, even where in the present instance it turned out to be inconsequential because neither conflicting slate happened to win.
Check what happened in the 1876 election, when South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana all certified both the Democratic and Republican slates of electors as winners and sent the votes from both sets of electors to Congress to figure out which were the correct ones.
Under present federal law (3 U.S.C. ยงยง3-21), states have the initial responsibility for determining any controversies or contests between electors by at least six days before the date electors are supposed to meet and cast their votes, where the certificates of ascertainment represent the state’s final determination on the matter. It is not a mere formality. If the certification is not timely, the votes can be challenged during counting (by one Senator and one Representive); then Congress need not accept the credentials of the electors and theoretically could throw out that all of the state’s votes.
Secretary of State Padilla would seem to have forgotten that electoral votes are cast by real electors and not simply a mathematical exercise. As a public official, he should have known better.