The Georgia Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday about whether Claudia De la Cruz and Cornel West are qualified to be on the Nov. 5 presidential ballot.
Georgia’s highest court will determine whether a vote for either candidate will count. Overseas and military ballots, which were printed before a Fulton County Superior Court judge disqualified the two left-wing candidates earlier this month, were mailed out last week listing West and De la Cruz alongside four other presidential candidates, including Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.
A central question the court will answer is whether signatures on petitions submitted by the West and De la Cruz campaigns must be filed by the candidates or if they may be filed by one of the 16 potential electors representing them.
West and De la Cruz cleared the minimum of 7,500 petition signatures to qualify for the ballot, but state law requires those signatures to be submitted in the name of one of a candidate’s state electors. The decisions by two Fulton judges held that none of their presidential electors submitted signatures in their own names.
The Fulton ruling overturned a decision by Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who had approved West and De la Cruz to be on the ballot over the objections of state Democrats who fear they could siphon away votes from Harris. Raffensperger’s decision itself overturned the recommendation of an administrative law judge who initially ruled the candidates were not properly qualified.
Attorney Elizabeth Young, representing Raffensperger before the court, said it’s too late to take West and De la Cruz off the ballot.
If the two minor presidential candidates were disqualified, notices would be posted at polling locations and in absentee ballots that a vote for either candidate would not count, Young said.
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