Pennsylvania lawsuit asks Commonwealth Court to remove RFK Jr. from presidential ballot • Pennsylvania Capital-Star

A lawsuit filed Thursday seeks to have independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. removed from the Pennsylvania ballot for the Nov. 5 election alleging fraud and other problems with his nominating papers.

The suit in Commonwealth Court filed on behalf of two voters from Dauphin County and Philadelphia claims the nominating papers Kennedy and running mate Nicole Shanahan filed with the Pennsylvania Department of State for placement on the ballot “demonstrate, at best, a fundamental disregard of the circulation process and Pennsylvania law.”

Kennedy, the son of U.S. attorney general and senator Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, is running as the nominee of the We the People Party. His campaign claims that unlike other independent candidates, Kennedy and Shanahan will appear on the ballots of all 50 states. 

The Pennsylvania suit claims, however, that Kennedy’s nominating petitions list a New York address that is not his home. Kennedy has made his primary residence in California since marrying his wife, actress Cheryl Hines, in 2014, the suit claims.

A trial in New York state court over Kennedy’s legal residence concluded Thursday and a judge is expected to soon decide whether Kennedy’s name should remain on the ballot there. A Democratic super PAC is backing the lawsuit. 

The New York suit makes a similar claim that although Kennedy’s New York nominating petitions bear an address in the New York City suburbs, his actual residence is in California.

Kennedy’s campaign said in a statement Thursday that his voter registration, falconry license, and law practice are all in New York, where he also pays taxes. Kennedy said he plans to move back to New York when “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star Hines retires from acting.

The residency issue presents an insurmountable problem for the Kennedy campaign because vice presidential nominee Shanahan also lives in California. The U.S. Constitution bars a state’s presidential electors from casting their votes for presidential and vice presidential candidates if both are from that state, meaning Kennedy could not receive California’s Electoral College votes.

“For these reasons, Candidate Kennedy listed his New York address with the intent to deceive Pennsylvania voters. Providing a California address would contradict his campaign and its goals,” the lawsuit claims, adding that because he allegedly acted with the intent to deceive voters, he is not entitled to amend the documents.

The suit also claims that Kennedy’s nomination papers fall short of the 33,043 signatures required by the Pennsylvania Election Code for non-major party candidates. 

Although federal courts have held that the requirement can be unconstitutional, and the secretary of the commonwealth will accept nomination petitions containing 5,000 signatures, Kennedy has not established that the requirement of a greater number of signatures is unconstitutional in his case, the suit says.

The original nominating petitions filed with the Department of State also show evidence of fraud, the suit alleges.

It says an inspection of the papers revealed “a startling concern.” Nearly 300 of the sheets submitted have a different circulator statement that is taped over the original document. Because the new statement cannot be removed without damaging the paper, this prevents examination of the original statement.

The suit also lists other defects with the documents including torn pages, “handwriting patterns and corrections” that suggest the voters whose names appear did not sign the petition, and that, based on the campaign’s practices in other states, some circulators whose names appear on the petitions were not the people who solicited voters’ signatures.

The suit was filed by attorney Timothy Ford of the Dilworth Paxson law firm in Philadelphia.

The Kennedy campaign did not immediately reply to a request for comment from the Capital-Star on Thursday.