The Rhode Island Libertarian Party issued a press release last week announcing their intention to challenge the state’s denial of ballot placement to Elijah Gizzarelli and Corey Vechhiarino, two of the party’s endorsed candidates for office.
Elijah Gizzarelli is running for governor and formerly served as the Region 2 Field Director for the 2020 Jo Jorgensen presidential campaign. Corey Vechhiarino is running for election to the Rhode Island House of Representatives to represent District 5 and serves as the current LPRI Outreach Director. Both Libertarians were denied a spot on the ballot after the Department of State claimed they failed to meet the minimum number of certified signatures.
The denial happens despite the Libertarian Party of Rhode Island stating that they turned in enough valid signatures, including what they describe as “an excess of 1,000 required” for Gizzarelli. Gubernatorial candidates in Rhode Island need 1,000 valid signatures regardless of party to qualify for the ballot whereas candidates for state representative require fifty.
Ballot access is especially critical to the party as Gizzarelli needs at least 5% of the vote in the upcoming gubernatorial election in order for LPRI to become a recognized party. As of December 2021, only the Republicans and Democrats are recognized political parties in Rhode Island.
“The systemic failures made by the Rhode Island Secretary of State show this process to be nothing more than an overly complicated exercise designed to make the prospect of gaining third-party ballot access (a prerequisite for establishing a recognized political party in the state of Rhode Island) arbitrary and capricious.” said LPRI Chair William Hunt.
While upset with the denial, LPRI is confident that it collected enough valid signatures to qualify both Gizzarelli and Vechhiarino for the ballot. In the press release, the party said that they are challenging the ruling over its certainty that they collected enough eligible signatures and the overall unfairness of the state’s ballot access laws.
The general election in Rhode Island is scheduled for November 8, 2022. The full press release can be viewed here.
Rhode Island only allows 9 days to gather petition signatures. The requirement in only 1,000 valid signatures, which is easy, but 9 days is a pretty short window to collect them, especially since each page has to be separated by city or town, and notarized, and turned in to the appropriate city or town clerks office. This is an unreasonably short time window, BUT, on the flip side, some 18 year old nobody just qualified as a candidate for Governor, so if he was able to do it, then a political party which was been around for over 50 years should have been able to do it.
Note that the LP has never had officially recognized party status in Rhode Island, and that the last time the LP of RI got a candidate on the ballot for Governor was 1976.