Delaware Liberal

It’s Official: Libertarians Kicked Off the Republican and Democratic Primaries

Celia Cohen had the scoop yesterday, and the news was published in today’s News Journal. The Libertarian candidate Will McVay (RD32) will not be allowed to run in either the Democratic party primary nor the Republican primary. Brent Wangen (DE-AL) will not be allowed to run in the Republican primary. Both will still be on the Libertarian line in the general election.

The decision to cut them out of the party primaries was made by Deputy Attorney General Ann Woolfolk, who is assigned to the ElectionsOffice. Woolfolk said candidates are barred from filing to run on multiple party ballot lines, according to a 1994 court decision, an earlier attorney general’s report and the phrase “political party” in state law.

Candidates can be listed on the ballot under multiple parties if they are nominated by at least one of the parties, but not when they file without party backing.

Woolfolk said the Election Office received letters from both political parties stating that McVay is neither “affiliated” with their party nor nominated by them. The parties had begun to raise objections when McVay announced he was entering both primaries. The Republicans submitted an identical letter for Wangen.

Yes, to me this is the key difference with the Margaret Rose Henry situation. Henry was nominated by the Republican party. Neither Wangen nor McVay were nominated by the Republicans or the Democrats, in fact, I don’t know if they even knew them.

As Celia Cohen’s post said, the decision came down to a statement issued by the Attorney General’s office in 1994. This came from a reading of the election law.

Forsten and Woolfolk point to a court ruling and separate attorney general’s opinion from 1994 as the justification for removing McVay and Wangen.

State law requires a primary candidate to notify the chairman of “their respective political party” when filing to run.

Commenter The Straight Scoop posted the relevant portion of the state election law in an earlier thread:

Comment by The Straight Scoop on 10 July 2010 at 11:42 am:
OK, here’s something from the Delaware Code that might shed some light…

Title 15, Chapter 31 (Primary Elections)

3106(a)(2) Candidates for all other offices:

a. All candidates for county or countywide office, members of the General Assembly and/or municipal office for any municipality holding its election at the time of the general election shall notify the county chair, or the county chair’s designee, in writing (or the city chair, or the city chair’s designee, if applicable for municipal candidates) of their respective political party in their county of residence on forms prescribed by the State Election Commissioner on or before the deadline set forth in § 3101(1) of this title.

Let’s strip away the excess language and get to the heart of it:

All candidates for non-statewide office shall notify the county chair of their respective political party in their county of residence before the deadline. (emphasis mine)

This is an extremely rudimentary reading of the code, but doesn’t that imply that to be a candidate in a primary election, you must be a member of that political party?

Also, the next subsection says that filing fees must be “payable to the county committee of the candidate’s political party…”

Again, a direct reference to the candidate’s political party in a primary. I’m not an attorney, but I have to imagine that adds fuel to the debate. And it accommodates Anon’s request to read the code and post a specific example that might this candidacy.

Feel free to discuss…

Apparently the decision was partly based on a judge’s ruling. There was a candidate that previously tried to run on two lines:

A few weeks after Ridgely’s decision, the Attorney General’s Office issued an opinion when John Reda tried to run for the state Legislature as a Libertarian and a Republican.

“The question is whether a candidate may have more than one respective party. We conclude that he may not,” the opinion states, denying Reda the ability to run under both banners.

My understanding after reading is that candidates can run on multiples lines as a fusion candidate, but they must be nominated by that party if they aren’t registered with that party. This makes sense to me. If this is the understanding the state has of the election law, I really see no need for further legislation addressing the issue.

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