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North Carolina election board stalls on two, approves Constitution Party

Presidential hopefuls Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of We the People and Cornel West of Justice for All Party still denied

https://www.thecentersquare.com/north_carolina/article_59f7c86c-3e22-11ef-a57f-7b6a7d229fc9.html

Excerpt:

Sparks flew as the North Carolina Board of Elections decided Tuesday to further delay voting to approve ballot access for the We the People Party and the Justice for All Party.

The Constitution Party, a third which met the signature threshold as mandated by state statute, was approved. Randall Terry is its presidential nominee. Conservative values are the party’s calling card; the two delayed trend in the opposite direction and threaten to siphon votes for Democrats.

This comes as the board, which met June 26 and delayed all three parties’ access, faces a federal investigation by the Committee on the Judiciary of the U.S. House of Representatives, led by Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio.

“I’m just completely at a loss for what is going on here,” Kevin Lewis, a Republican, said in the Tuesday meeting. “It’s not making sense to me. I think the board is bringing a lot of bad publicity on the board. Your motives are starting to be questioned.”

At the last board meeting, each of the parties were denied 3-2 by a party-line vote.

Chairman Alan Hirsch, Jeff Carmon and Siobhan Millan, all Democrats, voted against while Republicans Stacy Eggers and Kevin Lewis voted in favor.

The federal investigation launched a week ago. It comes two years after the state board was litigated and shown to have improperly denied the Green Party access to the ballot in 2022.

“The Committee on House Administration and the Committee on the Judiciary are concerned that the NCSBE’s decision was politically motivated and may have been done to influence the 2024 presidential election by limiting the candidates for which voters may cast their ballots,” wrote Jordan and Rep. Bryan Steil, R-Wisconsin, and chairman of the House Administration Committee.

While longshot Terry will gain access, still awaiting are presidential hopefuls Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (We the People) and Cornel West (Justice for All Party).

.....North Carolina has 16 electoral college votes and is considered one of seven key battleground states representing 93 electoral college votes. The others are Pennsylvania (19), Georgia (16), Michigan (15), Arizona (11), Wisconsin (10) and Nevada (six).

.....Hirsch, the chairman, asked to discuss Lewis’ concerns “offline” before saying he will “promptly” schedule the next meeting. He said he wanted to allow staff to complete their investigations into the signatures submitted by the We the People party and the Justice for All Party.

The Democrat’s reasoning is ironic. Photo identification laws and U.S. citizenship laws are routinely challenged by his party, inclusive of litigation despite overwhelming approval by North Carolina voters in the case of the former.

In response, Eggers said the board should avoid going on a “fishing expedition” to try to find invalid signatures, especially as both parties were significantly over the required threshold for signatures.

.....The Justice for All Party also called the board’s subpoenas “illegal.”

“This is political persecution orchestrated by Marc Elias and the NC Democrats. Regardless of your party affiliation, should be rebuked entirely,” the party said in a statement.
The North Carolina GOP also released a statement in favor of the parties.

.....“This board is yet again engaging in blatant partisanship, this time clearly aimed at preserving the political prospects of Democrats, specifically President Joe Biden in this state’s General Election,” said North Carolina Republican Party Chairman Jason Simmons in a letter to the board.