Judge orders Sanders, others to be reinstated to New York primary ballot (election in June)

The Hill ^ | 5/05/20 | Tal Axelrod

[Libloather]

A federal judge issued a ruling Tuesday requiring New York to hold its presidential primary in June and restore Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and other former presidential contenders to the ballot.

The ruling from Judge Analisa Torres of the Southern District of New York, an Obama appointee, said that Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D) decision to scrap his state’s primary violated the First and 14th Amendment rights of White House contenders who have since ended their campaigns.

“The Court concludes that Plaintiffs and Plaintiff-Intervenors have shown a clear and substantial likelihood of success on the merits of their claim that the Democratic Commissioners’ April 27 Resolution removing Yang, Sanders, and eight other Democratic presidential candidates from the ballot deprived them of associational rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution,” Torres ruled, referring to entrepreneur Andrew Yang, another former presidential candidate who filed the lawsuit against New York.

Cuomo first announced in April that he was cancelling New York’s presidential primary after Sanders dropped out of the race and essentially locked up Biden’s claim to the Democratic nomination. Still, Sanders had declared that he planned on remaining on upcoming primary ballots to win more delegates, who can work to influence the party’s platform at this summer’s Democratic National Convention.

“We shouldn’t have nonessential primaries. There is only one candidate who is running,” New York Democratic Party Chairman Jay Jacobs said at the time.

[Libloather]

Someone really should wake up Gropin' Joe and tell him.

[frogjerk]

Who was the plantiff?

[House Atreides]

Yay!! Finally some GOOD NEWS from New York.

[libstripper]

Actually, the decision is probably to his advantage, him being the only remaining active candidate. Once he wins, he’ll have a group of genuinely elected delegates, making it that much the harder to oust him.

[SmokingJoe]

How so?

[ctdonath2]

Yang, I think.

[ctdonath2]

“We shouldn’t have nonessential primaries. There is only one candidate who is running,” New York Democratic Party Chairman Jay Jacobs said at the time.

Democrats oppose democracy.

[Svartalfiar]

I’m confused. What does the First or Fourteenth Amendments have to do with primary voting? Hell, the STATES shouldn’t even be involved in the primaries, much less the FedGov!

[mewzilla]

Yang and Sanders both.

Up yours, DNC. Ditto for your lapdog, Cuomo.

[mewzilla]

See Section 2 of the 14th Amendment. I’m no lawyer, but I think that’s what applies here.

[libstripper]

If the delegates just went to him by default, there wouldn’t be an official declaration that he’d actually won them. If he wins them in an election, he’s won them. Same thing holds for the remaining primaries, until he’s up to a majority. At that point it’s going to be very hard for the Democrat leadership to change candidates, much harder than if the delegates were just his by default and the leadership could fool with them.

[Svartalfiar]

See Section 2 of the 14th Amendment. I’m no lawyer, but I think that’s what applies here.

But why would it apply? This isn't an election - it's a primary. The government shouldn't be involved whatsoever, a primary is (should be) 100% a party-run thing. The only involvement from government should be giving the parties the option to use public property (libraries, police stations, schools) as a polling location.

Really, the parties should be much more restrictive - there should be no open voting in a primary, and if I was in charge of one, it would be limited to voters who were registered for at least a year or so. Likely give double votes to people who are actively involved in the party, as opposed to random people coming off the street.

Also, primary priority would be formulated based on party loyalty - States with the most Repubs in State/FedGov, Repub Govs, etc would do their primaries first. Then Iowa can go in the middle of the pack, and screw putting corn in my gas tank. But this gets into much wider fixes needed than what this article/conversation is about :p