HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A federal judge has turned down Cornel West's request to be included on the presidential ballot in the key battleground state of Pennsylvania, expressing sympathy for his claim but saying it's too close to Election Day to make changes.
U.S. District Judge J. Nicholas Ranjan said in an order issued late Thursday that he has “serious concerns” about how Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt is applying restrictions in state election code to West.
“The laws, as applied to him and based on the record before the court, appear to be designed to restrict ballot access to him (and other non-major political candidates) for reasons that are not entirely weighty or tailored, and thus appear to run afoul of the U.S. Constitution,” Ranjan wrote.
West, a liberal academic currently serving as professor of philosophy and Christian practice at Union Theological Seminary in New York, would likely draw far more votes away from Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris than from the Republican candidate, former President Donald Trump. West's lawyers in the case have deep Republican ties.
“If this case had been brought earlier, the result, at least on the present record, may have been different,” Ranjan wrote in turning down the request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction.
An appeal will be filed immediately, West lawyer Matt Haverstick said Friday.
“This is a situation where I think, given the constitutional rights, that any ballot access is better than no ballot access,” Haverstick said. “We'd be content if Dr. West got on some ballots, or even if there was a notification posted at polling places that he was on the ballot.”
Matt Heckel, press secretary for the Pennsylvania Department of State, said in an email that Ranjan reached the right outcome but that Schmidt “respectfully” disagrees with the judge's opinion regarding his agency’s enforcement of the election code. Heckel noted state courts had previously sided with the Department of State.
“One of the dangers of such last-minute litigation is that courts do not have adequate time to review the law in making their decisions,” Heckel wrote.
Ranjan cited federal precedent that courts should not disrupt imminent elections without a powerful reason for doing so. He said it was too late to reprint ballots and retest election machines without increasing the risk of error.
Putting West on the ballot at this point, the judge ruled, “would unquestionably cause voter confusion, as well as likely post-election litigation about how to count votes cast by any newly printed mail-in ballots."
West, his running mate in the Justice for All Party and three voters sued Schmidt and the Department of State in federal court in Pittsburgh on Sept. 25, arguing the department's interpretation of election law violates their constitutional rights to freedom of association and equal protection. Specifically, they challenged a requirement that West's presidential electors — the people ready to cast votes for West in the Electoral College — should have filed candidate affidavits.
In court testimony Monday, West said he was aiming for “equal protection of voices.”
“In the end, when you lose the integrity of a process, in the end, when you generate distrust in public life, it reinforces spiritual decay, it reinforces moral decadence,” West testified.
Ranjan was nominated to the court by Trump in 2019. All 14 U.S. Senate votes against him, including that of Harris, then a senator from California, were cast by Democrats.
FILE - Progressive activist Cornel West speaks at a demonstration in Union Park outside the Democratic National Convention, Aug. 21, 2024, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
Back-to-back hurricanes have jumbled the presidential campaign schedules of Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.
Trump and Harris have separately gone to Georgia to assess hurricane damage and pledge support. Harris also has visited North Carolina, requiring the candidates to cancel campaign events elsewhere and use up time that is a precious resource in the final weeks before any election. Both Georgia and North Carolina are political battlegrounds.
Meanwhile, a recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that a solid majority of Hispanic women have a positive opinion of Harris and a negative view of Trump. Hispanic men are more divided on both candidates.
Follow the AP’s Election 2024 coverage at: https://apnews.com/hub/election-2024.
Here’s the latest:
Doug Emhoff, Kamala Harris’ husband, says Donald Trump won’t debate his wife again because he was badly beaten in their first encounter.
“He’s afraid that that’s going to happen again,” Emhoff says in an interview for the MSNBC show “Morning Joe.”
The husband of the Democratic nominee says Trump would rather spread “this fog of misinformation and disinformation and gaslighting” than face Harris directly.
Emhoff says he doesn’t have the time to be angry at Trump’s criticisms of him and his wife, because that would be a “distraction” and the focus of the Democratic ticket is on campaigning to win the Nov. 5 election.
Democratic vice presidential nominee Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is firing back at Donald Trump in Michigan for insulting Detroit while campaigning in the city.
Trump said Thursday that if Vice President Kamala Harris wins the White House, “The whole country will be like — you want to know the truth? It’ll be like Detroit.”
Walz was to use a campaign event in nearby Warren, Michigan, to attack Trump’s record in the battleground state, according to prepared remarks shared by the campaign.
“Maybe if he ever spent any time in the Midwest, he’d know Detroit is experiencing a great American comeback. Crime is down. The city is growing. Factories are opening again,” he was to say. "But all these guys know about manufacturing is how to manufacture bulls—-.”
Walz plans to quote Trump campaigning in the state in 2016 promising that they “won’t lose one” automotive plant if he’s elected. ”I guess, technically, that wasn’t a lie — because he lost 6 of them across the country,” Walz was to say.
Walz also plans to reassure the auto-heavy state that Harris was not trying to ban gas-powered vehicles.
Vice President Kamala Harris will participate in a town hall hosted by Charlamagne tha God on Tuesday, the influential radio host announced on his show Friday.
The appearance comes as Harris’ campaign is looking to shore up support among Black men for her candidacy.
The announcement comes a day after former President Barack Obama delivered a forceful call for Black men to support Harris during a campaign swing in Pennsylvania.
Democratic vice presidential nominee Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz says, “I don’t know if any of us do everything right,” as he tried to draw some distance between the Democratic ticket and President Joe Biden.
Speaking to ABC’s "Good Morning America,” Walz was asked whether he and Vice President Kamala Harris would have done anything different over the last four years.
“Look, I don’t know if any of us do everything right,” he replied. “But I can tell you he’s done everything in the best interests of the American public.”
Harris drew fire from former President Donald Trump when she told “The View” earlier this week that she couldn’t think of a difference with Biden — before saying she would put a Republican in her Cabinet if elected.
Walz also used the interview to try to walk back his call at a fundraiser this week to eliminate the electoral college. Harris’ campaign quickly stated it doesn't support such a move and Walz told ABC, “My position is the campaign’s position.”
Republican vice president nominee Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, speaks during a campaign event in Greensboro, N.C., Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)
Democratic vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz speaks to the crowd during an early voting rally at Palo Verde High School in Tucson, Ariz., Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024. (Kelly Presnell/Arizona Daily Star via AP)
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris poses for a photo with a supporter after speaking at a campaign event Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, on the Gila River Indian Community reservation in Chandler, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at a meeting of the Detroit Economic Club, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
