On January 14, a lawsuit was filed against some Pennsylvania ballot access restrictions that pertain to primary election petitions. The lawsuit challenges the ban on out-of-state circulators for primary petitions. It also challenges the requirement that each sheet of a primary petition be notarized. And it challenges the law that says voters may sign only one petition for the same office.
The plaintiffs are Benezet Consulting LLC and Trenton Pool, who intend to collect signatures to get Rand Paul and perhaps other presidential candidates on the Pennsylvania presidential primary ballot. Pennsylvania primary petitions for statewide office need 2,000 signatures. They can only be circulated in a three-week period. This year, the period is January 26 to February 16. The Pennsylvania primary is April 26, 2016. The case is Benezet Consulting v Cortes, middle district, 1:16cv-74. It was assigned to Judge John E. Jones, Bush Jr. appointee.
The same three restrictions as applied to general election petitions were struck down in Pennsylvania on March 2, 2015, and the state did not appeal. That case was Green Party of Pennsylvania v Aichele, 89 F.Supp.3d 723 (eastern district). The only difference in the issues in the two cases are that one case pertains to primary petitions and the other to general election petitions; also the primary petition case challenges the law (not applicable to general elections) that the circulator must be registered in the same party as the candidate whose petition is being circulated.
