For Democrats, there’s no better way to show your love for “democracy” than to remove your political opponents from the ballot.
That’s exactly what happened in Michigan on Friday, when the state’s Bureau of Elections abruptly disqualified left-wing presidential candidate Cornel West from appearing on the November ticket. The agency operates within the Office of Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat.
In his letter to West’s campaign, Elections Director Jonathan Brater claimed, as USA Today described, that “the affidavits of identity submitted to the Secretary of State’s Office in June for West and his vice presidential running mate, Melina Abdullah, were not properly notarized.” Former state Democrat Party Chair Mark Brewer reportedly brought a challenge to the affidavits on July 23 as part of his work with Clear Choice Action, a Democrat-affiliated super PAC seeking to keep left-leaning third-party presidential candidates off the November ballot.
West’s campaign was first notified about the challenge on July 26 and did not respond by the Aug. 2 deadline, according to Brater.
“Your affidavit of identity was not notarized in compliance with the laws of the state where it was notarized (Colorado), and therefore is not a valid notarization under the Michigan Law on Notarial Acts,” the elections director wrote.
Brater gave the West campaign five days to file a rebuttal to the disqualification, according to USA Today.
Democrats’ bid to keep West off Michigan’s fall ballot is not an anomaly, but part of a concentrated effort to deny battleground state ballot access to left-of-center candidates who could hamper Vice President Kamala Harris’ electoral prospects.
Last Wednesday, David Strange, a Democratic National Committee (DNC) official, filed a complaint with the Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC) seeking to bar the Green Party from having a presidential candidate (Jilly Stein) on the state’s November ticket. Strange also filed a similar complaint challenging West’s Wisconsin ballot access earlier this month, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
The WEC dismissed Strange’s complaint against the Green Party on Friday, arguing that, as the Associated Press summarized, the filing “names commissioners as respondents and they can’t ethically decide a matter brought against them.” A DNC official reportedly claimed the organization plans to file a lawsuit in court to have Stein removed from Wisconsin’s 2024 ballot.
A Democrat-led effort to remove Stein from Nevada’s fall ballot was struck down by a state judge last week.
Democrats have also sought to remove independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from the November ticket in various battleground states such as North Carolina and Pennsylvania. More recently, they succeeded in convincing a Democrat judge to kick Kennedy off New York’s 2024 ballot.
These tactics mirror a strategy leftists used in previous elections to help Democrats.
Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He previously served as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
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