{"id":1630492,"date":"2022-09-02T07:18:45","date_gmt":"2022-09-02T11:18:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1630492"},"modified":"2022-09-02T07:21:58","modified_gmt":"2022-09-02T11:21:58","slug":"democrats-are-the-real-threat-to-democracy-just-ask-the-green-party-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/democrats-are-the-real-threat-to-democracy-just-ask-the-green-party-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats Are The Real Threat To Democracy \u2014 Just Ask The Green Party"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">26<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fdemocrats-are-the-real-threat-to-democracy-just-ask-the-green-party-2%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1630492&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The Green Party will appear on the ballot in North Carolina\u2019s upcoming Senate contest this November, a federal judge has ruled \u2014 despite a coordinated Democratic effort to prevent it.<\/p>\n<p>After the Green Party submitted thousands of signatures for its candidate to appear on the ballot in North Carolina, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) \u2014 represented by Russia Hoax lawyer Marc Elias\u2019s law firm \u2014 began\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wral.com\/tangled-efforts-fraud-allegations-may-keep-green-party-off-the-ballot-in-nc\/20362978\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">contacting<\/a>\u00a0the people who signed the petition for ballot access and asked them to remove their signatures.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Even the Green Party\u2019s candidate himself, Matthew Hoh, received text messages from the DSCC asking him to remove his signature from the petition and saying \u201cthe Green Party takes votes away from Democrats, which helps Republicans win.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MatthewPHoh\/status\/1540745516169961472\"><\/a><\/figure>\n<p>Leading up to the state Board of Elections\u2019 vote to certify the signatures, several letters were sent to the board from Michael Vincent Abucewicz \u2014 a Raleigh resident whose lawyer happens to be from the Elias Law Group \u2014 that included 145 affidavits or declarations from people who said they wanted their signatures removed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In June, the state Board of Elections\u2019 Democratic majority voted not to certify the Green Party, citing allegations that many of their 22,521 signatures submitted were fraudulent. Republican board member Tommy Tucker raised questions about the board\u2019s 3-2 party-line vote,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wral.com\/tangled-efforts-fraud-allegations-may-keep-green-party-off-the-ballot-in-nc\/20362978\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">saying<\/a>\u00a0that while Republican calls for aggressive oversight into signature matching have been disregarded, \u201cwe\u2019re making a whole-hearted effort on the Green Party.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Luckily, in August, a federal judge\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/local\/raleigh\/2022\/08\/08\/green-party-senate-race-ballot-north-carolina\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">overturned<\/a>\u00a0the state Board of Elections\u2019 ruling, and the Green Party candidate Matthew Hoh will appear on the ballot in November.<\/p>\n<p>This isn\u2019t the first time Democrats have conspired to get the Greens kicked off the ballot, however. Democratic operatives, often led by Elias, have mounted effort after effort to disenfranchise Green Party voters whenever their candidate has threatened Democrats\u2019 chance of winning.<\/p>\n<p>For all of Elias\u2019s recent talk of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.democracydocket.com\/news\/a-constellation-of-anti-voting-groups-threaten-democracy\/?emci=61e3becc-5c1e-ed11-bd6e-281878b83d8a&amp;emdi=38bf2258-ed1e-ed11-bd6e-281878b83d8a&amp;ceid=14743692\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">right-wing election denialism<\/a>\u00a0(read: election integrity advocacy) posing a threat to democracy, perhaps he should look in a mirror. He\u2019s been denying Green Party members the vote for years.\u00a0<em>Hint:\u00a0<\/em>It\u2019s never been about democracy. It\u2019s always been about keeping the Democratic Party in power.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Disenfranchising Voters Since \u201904<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>When Elias was general counsel for Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004, he was behind an effort by the Democratic National Committee that <a href=\"https:\/\/ballotpedia.org\/Ralph_Nader_v._Democratic_National_Committee\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">mobilized<\/a> more than 53 law firms and 90 lawyers to file 24 suits in 18 states to remove independent candidate Ralph Nader (formerly of the Green Party) from the ballot. The lawsuits were frivolous, but they <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/archive\/opinions\/2004\/09\/05\/parties-to-injustice\/97c120e8-48ff-4ec6-b956-88fa926f7913\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">drained<\/a> Nader\u2019s campaign of precious financial resources.<\/p>\n<p>When Nader sought relief in federal court against these lawsuits, he was denied. A Fordham Urban Law Journal analysis\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ir.lawnet.fordham.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&amp;httpsredir=1&amp;article=2246&amp;context=ulj\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">found<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cthe federal courts which heard these cases defied precedent, and made errors of both fact and law when they denied relief to voters who wished to vote for Nader \u2026 that denial of injunctive relief completely disenfranchised tens of thousands of voters in the presidential election.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But that\u2019s not all. Nader\u2019s petitioners for ballot access in several states were harassed by Democratic operatives to get them to remove their signatures from petitions. Multiple petition gatherers and signers were bombarded with phone calls and home visits to that effect. Even private investigators showed up at petitioners\u2019 homes, telling them they\u2019d be guilty of a felony if any information on the petition was wrong. Terry McAuliffe, then-chair of the Democratic National Committee,\u00a0reportedly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/archive\/opinions\/2004\/09\/05\/parties-to-injustice\/97c120e8-48ff-4ec6-b956-88fa926f7913\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">told<\/a>\u00a0Nader he had approved of these actions.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After the election, Nader sued the Democratic National Committee for compensatory and punitive damages. By the time his case made it to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2009, the court ruled the statute of limitations on Nader\u2019s allegations had run out.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2><strong>2020 Green Party Suppression\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>During the 2020 presidential election, Democratic Party operatives also kicked Green Party candidates off the ballot, fearing they would take much-needed votes from then-candidate Joe Biden.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In Wisconsin, despite filing nearly twice the number of signatures necessary, Green Party presidential nominee Howie Hawkins was kept off the ballot for a frivolous technicality. In August 2020, the Wisconsin Elections Commission disqualified Hawkins from the ballot in a party-line vote because his running mate listed an incorrect address on her nominating petition. As The Federalist\u2019s Editor-in-Chief Mollie Hemingway writes in her book,\u00a0\u201cRigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections,\u201d \u201cThe Wisconsin Elections Commission did not allow the Green Party to make the case that the candidate had merely moved during the process of collecting signatures to get placed on the Wisconsin ballot.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Even after the Green Party appealed the Wisconsin Elections Commission\u2019s decision to keep it off the ballot, the court\u2019s three liberal justices along with RINO Republican Brian Hagedorn\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wicourts.gov\/sc\/opinion\/DisplayDocument.pdf?content=pdf&amp;seqNo=288664\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">ruled<\/a>\u00a0that it was simply\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.maciverinstitute.com\/2020\/09\/how-the-wisconsin-election-commission-illegally-disenfranchised-the-green-party\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">too close to the election to reprint ballots<\/a>, and therefore it would be too inconvenient to overturn the Wisconsin Elections Commission\u2019s decision. This shocked the conservatives on the court, who wrote in their dissent that the candidates had \u201csatisfied all requirements necessary to secure their spot on the ballot as candidates of the Green Party, but the Wisconsin Elections Commission, with the outrageous acquiescence of the majority, denies them their rightful place.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>During that same election cycle, Democrats also kept the Greens off the ballot\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsws.org\/en\/articles\/2020\/09\/18\/penn-s18.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">in Pennsylvania<\/a>. Democratic activists claimed Hawkins\u2019 running mate, Angela Walker, had failed to comply with election code requirements regarding candidate affidavits. They alleged Walker had faxed a copy of her affidavit without a cover letter and therefore should be disqualified from appearing on the ballot. The Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania denied the Democrats\u2019 request over such a \u201cbureaucratic snafu.\u201d Democratic Party operatives were not satisfied, however, and appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, whose Democratic majority overturned the lower court\u2019s ruling. The Green Party was kept off the 2020 ballot in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n<p>Keeping the Green Party off the ballot in key battleground states was a strategic move by Democrats to ensure as many votes as possible went to Joe Biden. In 2016, the Green Party scored 50,000 votes in Pennsylvania. By keeping the party off the ballot in 2020, those votes were more likely to go to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2020\/09\/17\/politics\/pennsylvania-supreme-court-green-party-presidential-ballot\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Biden<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Green Party Voters, Beware<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Democrats\u2019 concerted effort to keep Green Party candidates off the ballot is far from over.<\/p>\n<p>Already the Greens\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/greens-deserve-voting-rights-too-green-party-independent-candidates-voter-suppression-democrats-election-law-11642632021\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">appeared<\/a>\u00a0on 16 fewer state ballots in 2020 than they did in 2016, thanks to petty Democrat lawsuits. In Montana, Democrats sued to keep the Green Party off the ballot in both 2018 and 2020. They were also blocked from appearing in the U.S. Senate and House races in Texas in 2020. Thus, as long as Green Party candidates have the potential to siphon off votes from Democrats in key battleground races, they will be kept off the ballot by partisan operatives like Elias.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>So much for being the party of \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/why-democrats-keep-bringing-up-voting-rights\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">voting rights<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Victoria Marshall is a staff writer at The Federalist. Her writing has been featured in the New York Post, National Review, and Townhall. She graduated from Hillsdale College in May 2021 with a major in politics and a minor in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @vemrshll.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-comments mt-30 mt-sm-60\">\n<div class=\"article-comments-container d-flex flex-column align-items-center py-30\">\n    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"110\" height=\"106\" src=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/fdrlst-mark.svg\" class=\"img-fluid mb-20\" alt=\"The Federalist logo eagle mark\" \/>    <\/p>\n<p>Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.<\/p>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/plans\/pricing\/\" class=\"btn btn-on-white\">Subscribe<\/a>  <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Green Party will appear on the ballot in North Carolina\u2019s upcoming Senate contest this November, a federal judge has ruled \u2014 despite a coordinated Democratic effort to prevent it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1130,"featured_media":1630498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1630492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1130"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1630492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1630498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1630492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1630492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1630492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}