The Supreme Court on Friday said it would not restore the Green Party’s presidential candidate, Jill Stein, to the Nevada ballot in the coming election. Democrats had challenged her eligibility, saying her party had submitted flawed paperwork.
The court’s brief order gave no reasons, which is typical when it acts on emergency applications. There were no noted dissents.
The Nevada Supreme Court ruled this month that the Green Party’s failure to submit a sworn statement required by state regulations meant that its candidates could not appear on the ballot. The party acknowledged the lapse but said it had relied on instructions from a state election official.
The party was represented in the Supreme Court by Jay Sekulow, who has served as a lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump.
In response to an inquiry from the party in July, an official sent what she said were the required forms, saying “please use the documents attached to begin collecting signatures.”
The party submitted the required number of signatures, and election officials placed its candidates on the ballot after they verified a sampling of the signatures. The Nevada Democratic Party sued, saying the Green Party had failed to supply a sworn statement that the signatures were believed to be from voters registered in the counties in which they lived.
A state trial court rejected the Democrats’ challenge, saying the form was of no moment, merely stated a belief about something the state independently verified and was missing because a state official had given the wrong instructions.
But the Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the error was fatal. According to the majority in the 5-to-2 decision, the required sworn statements “provide a level of fraud prevention that other procedures, such as validating a sample of signatures, cannot provide.”
The majority acknowledged that the error was at least partly the product of an “unfortunate mistake” but said there was no evidence that election officials intended to mislead the Green Party.
In dissent, Justice Douglas Herndon wrote that the party had done what it was told to do and was in substantial compliance with the regulations.
“I am deeply concerned that our decision today excuses an egregious error by the secretary of state’s office that will result in a significant injustice,” he wrote.
He added, “It also shocks the conscience, offends judicial notions of fairness and contributes to a distrust in the election process in Nevada.”
In asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene, the Green Party said its rights to due process and equal protection had been violated.
The Nevada Democratic Party responded that “a civil servant’s mistake” did not excuse the Green Party from its obligation to comply with the law.
The state’s top election official, Secretary of State Francisco V. Aguilar, a Democrat, took no position in filings in the state courts. In the U.S. Supreme Court, however, he opposed the Green Party’s application, saying that “the process of printing and mailing ballots in Nevada is already underway” and that restoring the party’s candidates to the ballot would cause confusion and “undermine the integrity of Nevada’s election.”
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