Green Party of Pennsylvania

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sunday, September 20, 2020
 
CONTACT:
Chris Robinson, Communication Team

PA Green Party Warns of Rule by Corporate Club

With a 5-2 Democratic majority, the PA Supreme Court ruled on 9/17 that Green Party Presidential Candidate Howie Hawkins, would be taken off the PA ballot for the General Election. This overturned a previous ruling by the PA Commonwealth Court.

In response to this loss, by the Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA, www.gpofpa.org), Co-chair Alan Smith (Chester) lamented, "All the hard work we did, being forced to petition during a pandemic, risking our lives and the lives of others, over 30 volunteers painstakingly reviewing our petitions line by line, thousands of dollars spent in lawyers fees, and the courts still manage to kick two of our candidates off the ballot, one of them a queer, working class Black woman. The extensive bureaucratic processes to run for office or even get on the ballot are designed to keep everyday people disempowered and discouraged. If we want to live in a truly representative democracy we must push to eliminate these voter suppression techniques built into the system.

We must rally to end these Jim Crow like processes so that the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania will have true freedom of choice and will not be ruled by a corporate club. As it stands now there is no integrity to our elections. They are fraudulent."
 
In May, during statewide stay at home orders, the GPPA, along with the Libertarian and Constitution Parties, filed a petition for relief of candidate signature requirements. Much of the valid period for collecting signatures overlapped the COVID-19 pandemic and safety of petitioners was a big concern. The petition for waiving the signature requirement was denied, with the argument that the deadly pandemic did not constitute a “burden” for getting on the ballot. 
 
Despite the pandemic, Green Party volunteers came out in force and gathered 170% of the required signatures, successfully qualifying all state candidates for the ballot.  Almost immediately, the Democrats attempted to remove ALL Green Party candidates from the ballot by challenging 8,159 of the 8,551 signatures and citing irregularities in the nomination paperwork. This required a costly defense by the GPPA, a defense that was paid almost entirely by donations of individual voters.  A detailed analysis showed nearly every signature to be valid and testimony from the State showed that GPPA had submitted their paperwork as directed during a period when State offices were closed, and normal, in-person submission processes could not be followed. The Commonwealth Court then ruled in favor of the Green Party for all except Angela Walker as Vice Presidential candidate. The Democrats ultimately prevailed in removing Howie Hawkins, the Green Party Presidential candidate, by appealing the case to a predominantly Democratic PA Supreme Court. The other Green Party state-wide and district candidates will remain on the ballot for November. 

GPPA Steering Committee Member Jay Walker (Allegheny) said, “This is definitely a miscarriage of justice. The PA Department of State testified in court that they had told us we had filed everything we needed. They also testified that they checked with their higher ups AND with their attorneys to confirm that. No amount of legalizing will ever make up for how unjust it was to FORCE us to gather every single signature during a deadly global pandemic -- which we did -- and to then just kick us off the ballot anyway!” Walker is also a candidate for PA House District 23.

GPPA Co-Chair Sheri Miller (Adams) warned, “I know there is a lot of fear around this election, however, the idea that any political party can successfully remove a legitimate opponent from the ballot through bureaucratic manipulation should greatly concern every person who wants to live in a free society, regardless of whether they personally believe a Green Party candidate on the ballot would swing the election to the ‘greater evil.’ The greater evil is the acceptance of disenfranchising voters in a democracy. What did this exercise in voter suppression accomplish? Possibly the loss of the election for the Democrats in PA as thousands of angry people, many of whom would likely have voted for what they considered to be the lesser evil, decide to stay home on election day, disgusted with this entire mockery of our democracy. Apparently the Democrats learned nothing from their loss in 2016!”

Donations to the GPPA legal fund to help with court costs, may be made here, https://www.gpofpa.org/ballot_access_legal_fees. More information about 2020 GPPA candidates can be found at: https://www.greenslate2020.org/. The GPPA is an independent political party that stands in opposition to the two corporate parties. GPPA candidates promote public policy based on the Green Party’s Four Pillars: grassroots democracy, nonviolence, ecological wisdom, and social justice/equal opportunity. For further information about GPPA, please visit www.gpofpa.org. Please follow GPPA on social media: Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/gpofpa/,  and Twitter, https://twitter.com/GreenPartyofPA
Green Party of Pennsylvania
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, September 18, 2020
 
CONTACT:
Sheri Miller

DEMOCRATIC PARTY GUILTY OF MASSIVE VOTER SUPPRESSION

In the greatest act of voter suppression since Jim Crow legislation, the Democratic Party has disenfranchised 9 million voters in the Commonwealth by using an amendable paperwork error to remove Howie Hawkins from the Pennsylvania General Election ballot in November.

State election officials informed Green Party officers that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, submission of affidavits by fax copy to the Bureau of Elections, which offices were closed due to the pandemic, would be acceptable.

The Democrats failed at two other attempts to defeat democracy in the Keystone State, including a red herring challenge to the 8,500 signatures collected by the GPPA during the pandemic.  The Democrats falsely claimed the signatures were illegible but dropped the challenge when a simple check of the registered voters' database demonstrated their deceit.

Not satisfied, the Democrats doubled down their attack by appealing a lower court decision, which allowed the Green Party candidates to appear on the ballot, to the PA Supreme Court, which holds a 5-to-2 majority of Democratic Party Judges.

The Democrats claimed that the fax copy violated procedure and thereby made the Green Party candidate ineligible.  In the dissenting opinion, it was made clear that this was an amendable situation and should not bar the Green Party from the November election. The five Democratic Party judges disagreed.

There are two ways to defeat democracy, one way is by preventing citizens from voting, and the other is by preventing worthy candidates from appearing on the ballot. When the law can be used as a subterranean tool in a process which can only be labeled "political profiling" the meaning and the intent of the law is subverted as is the democracy from which those laws were supposed to have sprung.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Saturday, September 12, 2020
 
CONTACT:
Garret Wassermann
and
Chris Robinson, Communication Team

PA Greens Charge Democrats With Delaying 2020 Ballot

According to reports from the Associated Press, the PA Democratic Party has already signaled it intends to appeal a decision by Commonwealth Court to the PA Supreme Court. This on-going legal action risks delaying the printing and distribution of mail-in ballots, which are more critical than ever while the state still faces a lethal pandemic that makes typical events and voting systems unsafe. Any delay to the printing and distribution of ballots narrows the time window for voters to return the ballots in time to be counted.

“The Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA, www.gpofpa.org) calls on the PA Democratic Party to drop its frivolous legal challenge,” demanded GPPA Secretary Beth Scroggin (Chester). “Democrats should allow the mail-in ballots to be printed and distributed widely as soon as possible, and instead use their energy and money to join the Green Party in fighting against climate change, poverty, war, and the growing creep of fascism. The Democratic Party is now reinforcing growing concerns that cuts to the U.S. Postal Service by the current administration may further delay the return of mail-in ballots.”

Green Party presidential candidate Howie Hawkins had been placed on the Pennsylvania ballot alongside the Green Party's other statewide candidates according to a ruling by Commonwealth Court Judge J. Andrew Crompton on 9/9. GPPA Co-Chair Alan Smith (Chester) explained, “The Democrats had sued saying our signatures were fake. More than 30 volunteers spent countless hours reviewing the signatures, which were ruled valid by the court. The Democrats sued saying our paperwork was inaccurate. The court ruled that our paperwork was valid except for one minor technicality with an affidavit. For that reason, Angela Walker, the queer, Black woman we nominated for vice president, will not appear on the ballot. The Democrats forced our people to spend thousands of dollars and countless hours in a frivolous lawsuit all to get a queer, working class Black woman -- who works for people, planet, and peace -- removed from the ballot."

"It is clear that we submitted sufficient ballot signatures to be on the ballot. Angela Walker should be listed on the ballot alongside myself," said Howie Hawkins. "Democrats are causing needless delay and disruption, because even as it stands with Angela not on the ballot, our presidential electors can still vote Angela Walker for Vice Presidential if we win Pennsylvania." Without Howie and Angela on the ballot, no one will be talking about moving away from fossil fuels (fracking is a huge problem in PA) to avert climate meltdown. No one will be calling for a 75% reduction in military spending to be reinvested in our communities.

The Democratic Party had initially alleged various "defects" with the Green Party's petition signatures before volunteer validators confirmed that many of these challenges were erroneous. For example, some false challenges brought by the Democratic Party include claiming that living people who signed the petition were dead when they could easily be confirmed to still be alive; claiming that some registered voters were not registered at the address they signed, when a quick check of the registered voter database confirmed the address; and claiming that perfectly-legible signatures were "illegible." After Green Party volunteers had validated that many of the challenges were in error, the Democratic Party agreed to drop its challenge against the signatures and the down-ballot candidates, but continued with legal action against the Green Party presidential and vice-presidential candidates alleging that their paperwork was incorrectly filed.

Garret Wassermann (Pittsburgh), leader of the GPPA Green Wave Team, said, “The Green Party also calls for the PA General Assembly to end voter suppression by enabling easier ballot access and switching to a ranked choice voting system. Greens in PA must collect hundreds or thousands of signatures to be placed on the ballot for state office, while many democratic nations around the world such as Canada and the UK require only 100 signatures or less to run for national office.”
Tina Olson (Northampton), GPPA organizer in the Lehigh Valley, expressed her dismay, “These outlandish moves by the Democratic Party to suppress the rights of Green Party voters come as a shock and disappointment. This kind of voter suppression is just one of the many reasons that voters end up staying home on Election Day. If we can’t exercise our right to vote for our own candidates, we can’t very well claim to be a fully-realized representative democracy.”
 
Donations to the GPPA legal fund to help with court costs, may be made here, https://www.gpofpa.org/ballot_access_legal_fees. More information about 2020 GPPA candidates can be found at: https://www.greenslate2020.org/. The GPPA is an independent political party that stands in opposition to the two corporate parties. GPPA candidates promote public policy based on the Green Party’s Four Pillars: grassroots democracy, nonviolence, ecological wisdom, and social justice/equal opportunity. For further information about GPPA, please visit www.gpofpa.org or email contact@gpofpa.org. Please follow GPPA on social media: Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/gpofpa/, and Twitter, https://twitter.com/GreenPartyofPA.

For more information, please see:

“Reject Militarism on the Anniversary of 9/11” by Howie Hawkins, September 11, 2020, https://howiehawkins.us/reject-militarism-on-the-anniversary-of-9-11/;
“PA Greens will not be Silenced by Democrats,” Green Party of Pennsylvania News Release, August 12, 2020, https://www.gpofpa.org/pa_green_party_will_not_be_silenced_by_democrats; and
“PA Green Party Fights against Election Fraud,” Green Party of Pennsylvania News Release, July 16, 2020,  https://www.gpofpa.org/forms/shares/new?page_id=3777.
Green Party of Pennsylvania
September 10 at 11:13 AM  ·
Breaking: Democrats on Thursday signaled their intent to appeal a lower court decision ordering election officials to put the Green Party’s candidate for president on the ballot in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.
They filed an intent to appeal the case to the state Supreme Court, where the Democratic majority-panel will could decide the last remaining legal hangup before ballots can be mailed out to voters who applied for one.
The Democrats' protest targets what they say are disqualifying irregularities in how the Green Party candidates for president and vice president filed affidavits that accompany paperwork to get them on the ballot.
The lower court judge, a Republican, dismissed arguments that the presidential nominee, Howie Hawkins, should be barred from the ballot, but agreed that the Green Party’s vice presidential nominee should be barred.