|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
‘You’re on the ballot!’ SWP is on in Pennsylvania
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Container
|
| Contributor | data |
| Last Edited | data Aug 23, 2022 10:52pm |
| Logged |
0
|
| Category | News |
| Author | Janet Post |
| News Date | Tuesday, August 23, 2022 04:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | PHILADELPHIA — “You’re on the ballot! And good luck!” Larry Otter, the Socialist Workers Party’s lawyer in Pennsylvania, told Chris Hoeppner, the SWP candidate for U.S. Congress from the 3rd District, and the Militant Aug. 9.
“Despite moves by state elections officials in Harrisburg to violate the SWP’s constitutional right to be on the ballot, no one filed to challenge our petitions,” Osborne Hart, SWP candidate for U.S. Senate, told the press the same day. “We’ll be on the ballot, campaigning vigorously all across the state and beyond, promoting a working-class program and joining in actions by the labor movement, farmers and others fighting capitalist exploitation and oppression.”
In addition to Hoeppner, a freight rail worker and member of the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers Union (SMART), and Hart, the SWP is running Candace Wagner from Pittsburgh for governor. Wagner is a member of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen.
Supporters of the SWP, unionists and others had been organizing to fight any moves to bar Hoeppner from the ballot. Four months after petitioning had begun and less than a week before the deadline, when the SWP filed its petitions in Harrisburg July 27, election officials told Hoeppner he had enough signatures to be on the ballot, but that the requirement had just been raised from 1,000 to 2,300. The party submitted 2,422 signatures, well over two times what had been required.
Hoeppner and Otter were told the change had been sent out as a “tweet.” But it wasn’t changed on the state’s election website until July 30. And authorities never informed the SWP, but did send emails to the officially recognized “minor” parties, the Greens and Libertarians. This didn’t end up helping the Libertarians, a number of whose candidates have been challenged by Republican Party forces.
“It was an outrage what the state did, because I think the democratic process should mean equ |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
