Tuesday, August 9, 2016

Candidates for Pivotal NY State Senate Seat Challenge BOE Rulings


New York State Senate candidate Kevin Stocker’s attempt to force a Conservative Party Primary in the 60th district, suffered a setback Monday morning. The Erie County Board of Elections (BOE) upheld a ruling that Stocker did not have enough valid “Opportunity-To-Ballot” signatures.

Stocker, a registered Republican, is hoping to stage a write-in campaign against the Conservative Party’s endorsed candidate Chris Jacobs. He needs at least 240 valid signatures to make that happen.

“There are a lot of invalidated signatures on that petition and the vast majority of them were because Mr. Stocker went to the same people who had already endorsed a candidate and signed a petition for another candidate,” Republican Elections Commissioner Ralph Mohr said.

At a hearing Monday, Stocker and his attorney challenged the BOE ruling that more than 130 signatures were invalid. Although he remains 18 signatures short, he hopes to get the ruling overturned in State Supreme Court.

“I feel fairly confident that we’re going to be able to do that. It’s all going to depend on the judge we get,” he said.

Stocker said he believes the Conservative Party forged some of its signatures and backdated others.

“He has made a number of claims and most of those claims are contrary to what the law states, but he’s certainly entitled to take it to court,” Mohr said.

Stocker remains on the ballot for a Republican Primary against Jacobs. He has also sent a letter to the U.S. Attorney’s office and the FBI, accusing the Conservative Party of intimidation during this process.

Meanwhile, Mohr and Democratic Commissioner Len Lenihan were split on another 60th District challenge they heard Monday. Democratic candidate Amber Small is disputing the petitions of Green Party candidate James DePasquale.

Both commissioners agreed DePasquale had enough valid signatures to get on the ballot, but Lenihan agreed with Small’s attorney about a more general challenge.

The attorney argued all the petitions were invalid because the town listed on them was DePasquale’s mailing address and not the Municipality where he technically lives. Mohr disagreed. “I believe that I’m correct in saying that the mailing address properly identified the candidate who was running and that’s all that address needs to do is identify the person who is running,” he said.

Small also plans to challenge DePasquale’s signatures in State Supreme Court next week.

“There were certain issues which we raised which they in their Ministerial capacity couldn’t rule upon,” Attorney Frank Housh said. “That is allegations of potential fraud in the signature going process. They couldn’t rule on whether or not people were actually sworn and they couldn’t rule on whether or not a whole series of signatures on one of the petitions was actually the same individual’s writing.”

Small’s Campaign previously filed a public corruption complaint with the Erie County District Attorney’s office, claiming people connected to the Republican Party and Jacobs circulated DePasquale’s petitions.











NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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