On September 30, independent presidential candidate Shiva Ayyadurai filed a federal lawsuit against the Nebraska Secretary of State. Even though his petition had enough valid signatures, the Secretary of State kept him off because he was born in India. Lauters v Evnen, 4:24cv-03175. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge John Gerrard, an Obama appointee. Here is the Complaint.

No presidential candidate in history has filed so many lawsuits over constitutional qualifications and ballot access. In the distant past, states always put such candidates on the ballot, as happened in 1892 when the Prohibition Party nominated a 33-year old for vice-president. No state kept him off the ballot on the grounds that he didn’t meet the qualifications. That is because in 1892, people undrestood that the true candidates were the candidates for elector. Back then the voters of every state voted for individual candidates for elector.

In 1972, when the Socialist Workers Party nominated Linda Jenness, who was 33 years old, she waged a vigorous legal challenge to the Ohio decision to exclude her. But she lost that case, and did not sue any other states over that issue.

Peta Lindsay, the 2012 nominee of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, also an underage candidate, only filed one lawsuit, in California. When that lost, she did not file any other lawsuits.

But Ayyadurai has now sued New Jersey, Utah, Wisconsin, Tennessee, and Nebraska. His lawsuits always point out that the true candidates are his candidates for presidential elector, and they meet all the qualifications.