Weekly Ballot Access News: Kennedy Campaign Has Met Requirements for the Ballot in 42 of 50 States

By Leah Watson, Breaking News Reporter, The Kennedy Beacon

Earlier this week, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign announced it has submitted enough signatures to make the ballot in 17 new states. Kennedy therefore is now in play in 42 out of 50 states, where he has officially achieved ballot access or he has submitted the required number of signatures.

On July 29, the Kennedy campaign turned in signatures for these nine states: Connecticut, Idaho, Iowa, Maine, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. The campaign also announced that Kennedy is now officially on the ballot in Alaska, Indiana, and Nebraska.

On July 31, during a press briefing, Kennedy announced that his campaign has a sufficient number of signatures to get on the ballot in these additional eight states: Alabama, Arkansas, Kansas, Massachusetts, Montana, North Dakota, Vermont, and Virginia. Kennedy is officially on the ballot in 13 states, has submitted signatures in 19 states, and has completed his petitioning in 10 more states. 

After discussing the eight new states he qualifies in, Kennedy reflected on how during these past few months the media predicted that it was impossible for him to get on the ballot in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. 

But Kennedy and his campaign have prevailed. 

With only a few more state ballots to go, Kennedy and his team thanked the work of their devoted volunteers — over 100,000 across the country — who have collected over 1,000,000 signatures.  

“I had no idea how difficult it was for third-party candidates to access ballots in this country,” said Kennedy’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan. “I always assumed that we were an open Democracy that encourages as many qualified voices to speak,” she added, referencing how the campaign has had to dig into nuanced ballot access laws specific to each state.

“Independent ballot access is a labyrinth laced with a minefield,” said Nick Brana, the campaign’s Senior Advisor and Ballot Access Director. During the press briefing, Brana described how in many states, local officials are unaware of their own state’s requirements. He detailed the ridiculously specific ballot access laws from state to state. One of the greatest hurdles: If the petitions are not completed and filed correctly, they are at risk of being invalidated. 

All of these independent ballot access laws are “meant to be a barrier to any kind of challenge to the entrenched big money duopoly,” said Brana. 

According to Brana, Kennedy’s campaign is the most successful independent campaign in decades and has collected more signatures than any independent candidate in American history. To date, the campaign has also had a perfect record in defeating its legal challenges. 

“Our challengers, even with their 100 million dollars, have not actually been able to challenge signatures,” said Senior Ballot Access Council, Paul Rossi. This is because every signature filed goes through the campaign’s own independent validator, and it has consistently been within 1% to 2% of what has been ultimately determined to be valid by the states.

Because the competition cannot substantiate complaints against Kennedy’s signatures, Rossi said, “They’ve simply thrown a bunch of bogus, frivolous claims, in an effort to try and throw spaghetti against the wall, hoping some judge somewhere buys their lousy arguments.”  

This week, a lawsuit filed against Kennedy in New Jersey was dismissed by the Mercer County Superior Court as a wrong venue for the challenge. The suit stipulated that Kennedy’s nomination petition should be barred by New Jersey’s “sore loser” law as reported in The Kennedy Beacon.

The last independent presidential candidate to successfully get on the ballot in all 50 states was Ross Perot in 1992. Following that achievement, states established new rules to make it nearly impossible for any future independent candidate. Perot needed 300,000 signatures for his 50-state drive – a fraction of the number Kennedy is required to submit. 

In the press briefing, Amaryllis Kennedy, Kennedy’s Campaign Manager, described her organization’s massive ballot access undertaking as “scaling a glass mountain,” and said that they are beginning to reach the summit. Near the end of the briefing, the campaign reiterated that Kennedy will be on the ballot in all 50 states and the District of Columbia by the end of the summer, as the last certification deadlines are set in September.