Judge Upholds Petitioning Rules

Jason Bartlett needs to collect 64 signatures a day over 16 days to make the ballot for a Democratic State Senate primary. And he doesn’t need to collect the signatures in person.

That is constitutional, U.S. District Court Judge Janet Hall ruled Monday.

Or, more to the point, that is not unconstitutional.

Hall made that argument in a decision to deny a motion for a preliminary injunction against the rules that Gov. Ned Lamont created by executive order for how challengers can petition their ways onto primary ballots during the Covid-19 pandemic’s restrictions on public assembly.

Attorney Alex Taubes (himself a potential petition candidate in a State Senate primary) filed the suit on behalf of Bartlett and others challenging Lamont’s rules. Taubes argued that the rules — dropping the number of signatures needed (from 5 to 3.5 percent of the Democratic voters registered in a district); giving candidates an extra two days (from 14 to 16) to collect the signatures; allowing them to do it electronically — didn’t go far enough. He argued that the rules make it practically impossible to qualify for the Aug. 11 Democratic primary ballot and therefore violate challengers’ and voters’ 1st and 14th Amendment rights.

Read a previous story about that here.

In her decision — read it here  — Hall noted that the U.S. constitution largely leaves electoral matters to the states, but that Taubes is correct that the 1st and 14th Amendment do apply if state rules create a ​“severe burden” that leads to ​“exclusion or virtual exclusion from the ballot” in violation of the right to freedom of association.

But plaintiffs needs to reach a high bar to justify her granting the ​“extraordinary and drastic remedy” of a prelininary injunction, Hall wrote.

The plaintiffs failed to do that, she concluded. She argued the state law offers other avenues for making a ballot: getting the nomination for the seat at a party convention, say. Or winning 15 percent of the delegates at a convention.

And even if they have to petition, Lamont’s May 22 Executive Order 7LL eased the burden given the limits imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic, Hall concluded.

She used as an example Bartlett’s quest to make the Democratic primary ballot to challenge incumbent State Sen. Gary Winfield.

Under the new rules, Bartlett needs to collect 64 signatures a day over 16 days, and can do so electronically, Hall noted.

“Working with just four other circulators, Bartlett and his circulators would each need to secure 13 signatures a day to meet this requirement. Plaintiffs have failed to demonstrate that such a figure is impossible, or virtually impossible, to obtain. Indeed, one circulator alone working for the campaign of plaintiffs’ counsel obtained 13 signatures on May 28,” Hall wrote.

Reached Monday, Bartlett said he’s working hard to collect those signatures by the Thursday 4 p.m. deadline. This weekend his campaign began going door to door to collect signatures after relying primarily on online efforts.

“I think we’re going to do it. We’re not close yet. We have a big push today” with a crew of 10 helpers, Bartlett said.

Taubes said he’s taking a different route: He said he can’t collect the 1,116 signatures needed by Thursday to challenge incumbent State Sen. Martin Looney in the Aug. 11 Democratic primary. So instead he’s looking to collect the 215 signatures needed by Aug. 5 to have his name appear on an unaffiliated line in the Nov. 3 general electon. He plans to run as an ​“independent Democrat” the way Toni Harp did for mayor in the 2019 general election.