Political activist and academic Cornel West will appear on the ballot in North Carolina after a federal judge ruled on Aug. 12 that his Justice for All Party (JFA) can participate in the upcoming presidential race. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Terrence Boyle, a Ronald Reagan appointee, comes after the North Carolina State Board of Elections last month said the JFA would not be allowed.
The board denied JFA ballot access in a party-line 3-2 vote, despite it having reached the legally required number of 13,865 verified signatures. JFA submitted 17,141 verified signatures. However, the board raised concerns over irregularities in those petition signatures.
Judge Boyle found that the board, in denying the party ballot access, had imposed a severe burden on the rights of the plaintiffs—voters in support of JFA. “In declining to certify JFA as a new political party, the Board has categorically excluded JFA and its candidates from the ballot,” Judge Boyle wrote. “As a result, the Board has precluded those voters who wish to associate with both from exercising their First Amendment right to do so.”
“That is a severe burden on First Amendment rights,” the judge said. The judge also said the board had conducted a “woefully insufficient” and “flawed” survey and “extrapolated its conclusions to the rest of the signatures” when deciding the JFA could not appear on the ballot.
Contacting Petition Signers
In issuing its decision last month, the board said that after attempting to contact 250 people who’d signed petitions to include JFA on the ballot, only 49 responded. Approximately 18 of those stated they did not sign the petitions, three stated they didn’t remember signing, and 28 confirmed they did sign.
However, in his ruling, Judge Boyle said the board’s conclusion that a “substantial portion’ of signers advised the Board that they did not sign and that ‘many others’ were not told of JFA’s purpose does not withstand scrutiny. “The Board relied on a survey completed by NCSBE staff that suffers from serious flaws,” he said, and the board failed to use “narrow tailoring” to ascertain whether the party’s petition signatures were invalid.
“Narrow tailoring requires a scalpel; the Board used a blunt instrument,” he wrote. “The Board effectively disenfranchised over 17,000 North Carolina voters who signed petitions to certify JFA as a new political party on flawed, highly suspect grounds.”
As a result, Judge Boyle issued a preliminary injunction. The board must certify the JFA and extend the filing deadline, the judge said.
In a statement, JFA called the ruling a “landmark victory for democracy” that “sets a powerful precedent for all future third-party candidates in North Carolina.” “We fought hard against what we perceived as an unjust barrier to our participation in the democratic process, set by a partisan board,” said Italo Medelius, co-chair for the state JFA party. “Today, we celebrate not only our victory but the preservation of democracy.”
West announced in October 2023 that he would leave the Green Party to continue his 2024 presidential campaign as an independent. His running mate is Melina Abdullah, an activist and co-founder of the Black Lives Matter chapter in Los Angeles.
The Epoch Times has contacted the North Carolina State Board of Elections for comment.
Savannah Hulsey Pointer contributed to this report.
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