Fletcher Asks Kentucky Court to Bypass Appeal Regarding Ballot Access

Lexington, KY, Herald-Leader ^ | 04-29-03 | Brammer, Jack

[Theodore R.]

Posted on Tue, Apr. 29, 2003

Fletcher asks for bypass of appeal By Jack Brammer And Ryan Alessi HERALD-LEADER FRANKFORT BUREAU

FRANKFORT -With three weeks until the May 20 election, U.S. Rep. Ernie Fletcher asked the state's highest court yesterday to consider a legal challenge by a rival to keep him off the ballot in the Republican primary for governor.

The Kentucky Supreme Court needs to decide the case, said Fletcher, because "Kentucky voters earnestly desire and need to know that the candidates appearing on the ballot are duly qualified to serve the positions to which they seek election."

At issue is a legal attempt by the campaign of Republican candidate Steve Nunn and his running mate, Bob Heleringer, to get Fletcher out of the race. The case is under consideration at a lower-level appellate court.

Nunn, a state representative from Glasgow, said yesterday that he welcomes Fletcher's attempt to get a faster final ruling from the Supreme Court.

"That suits me. Move it on, expedite it, bring closure to it," he said. "That's all I'm asking for is closure. And whatever the ruling is, I will abide by it."

The legal squabble began in March when Heleringer successfully asked an Oldham Circuit judge to rule that Fletcher's original running mate, Hunter Bates, was not a legal candidate because he did not meet residency requirements. Fletcher, a congressman from Lexington, picked a replacement, former U.S. Attorney Steve Pence.

But Heleringer claimed in a lawsuit that Fletcher is not a bona fide candidate because he was not part of a bona fide slate before the Jan. 28 filing deadline and should be booted from the race.

After he lost at the circuit court level, Heleringer, a former state representative from Louisville, asked the state Court of Appeals last Friday to disqualify Fletcher from the race.

In his request yesterday to bypass the Court of Appeals and move the case immediately to the Supreme Court, Fletcher noted that even if the appellate court upheld the lower court's ruling, the Nunn-Heleringer campaign would have 30 days to ask the Supreme Court to review that decision.

That could drag the legal wrangling way past the May 20 election, he said.

Fletcher, in a 57-page response to Heleringer's appeal, called the Nunn camp's approach "a legal ambush" and "a fishing expedition" designed to paint Fletcher in a negative light.

He said Heleringer has not provided any state law that distinguishes between a "valid slate" and a "void slate" -- a key part of Heleringer's position.

Other candidates in the GOP gubernatorial primary are former Jefferson County Judge-Executive Rebecca Jackson and state Sen. Virgil Moore of Leitchfield.