The Libertarian Party of New York’s 2024 petitioning drive ended on May 28, 2024.
Larry Sharpe stood in as the Presidential candidate and was replaced with Chase Oliver after the convention while Rich Purtell stood in as the Vice Presidential candidate and was replaced by Mike ter Maat after the convention.
After the National Convention, I brought the petitions I collected in Washington, D.C. and travelled to Albany for the filing. I retrieved our pile of petitions from our Statewide Collector, Steve Healey. Special thanks to Steve for collecting them!
On Tuesday, May 28, the petitions were sorted and bound into 8 volumes. Special thanks to Mark Braiman, Evan Lebrecht, and my parents, Gregg and Amy Kolstee, for assisting.
I took the petitions to the New York State Board of Elections in the afternoon. Special thanks to Gary Donoyan for assisting with the filing.
Unfortunately, the New York State Board of Elections staff declared our petition invalid after a prima facie review.
On June 9, I attended the staff hearing, with support from Mark Braiman, Justin Carman, and Angela McArdle, who were also in attendence, and I read a statement. The Commissioners held their meeting on June 11 and officially invalidated our petition.
Our petition was not the only one declared invalid due to insufficient signatures. The Green Party’s petition was also declared invalid, despite Jill Stein’s efforts to speak to the commissioners at their meeting. Independent candidates Cornel West and Shiva Ayyadurai also had their petitions declared invalid.
The Libertarian Party also had downballot candidates, all of whom were also declared invalid: Brandon Williams (U.S. Congress 22), Evan Lebrecht (Assembly District 107), Miriam Osario (Assembly District 124), Mark Braiman (Assembly District 127), and Wendi Szabo (Assembly District 144).
The fight is far from over—whether there are legal routes or we launch a write-in campaign!