North Carolina court orders RFK Jr.’s name to be removed just before ballots are sent

RALEIGH, NC (WWAY) — The State Board of Elections has appealed Friday’s order by the NC Court of Appeals, which required election officials to remove Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name from 2024 general election ballots and print new ones. The appeal was filed with the NC Supreme Court Friday afternoon.

As the Supreme Court considers the appeal, State Board staff will work through the weekend to begin the process of coding new ballots without Kennedy’s name and providing proofs of the new ballots to county boards of elections for review. There are 2,348 different ballot styles statewide for the 2024 general election. More than 2.9 million ballots had already been printed before the order by the Court of Appeals.

The State Board asked the Supreme Court for an expedited decision so counties will not have to spend additional money preparing and printing new ballots if the State Board is successful in its appeal. In North Carolina, county boards of elections are responsible for ballot-related costs.

In an email to county election directors Friday evening, Karen Brinson Bell, the state elections director, asked counties to work hard to ensure ballots will be ready to go out to absentee voters no later than September 21, the federal deadline to send absentee ballots in a presidential election. Voting system and ballot printing vendors have indicated that it may take an additional 12-13 days to carry out the reprinting of ballots. If it’s determined these tasks cannot be completed by September 21, the State may request a waiver to the federal deadline.

Brinson Bell also told county officials not to send any ballots until a date is determined for all counties to do so, as the voting period should be the same for all absentee-by-mail voters.

Before the Court of Appeals’ ruling, the 100 county boards planned to send the first wave of ballots to eligible absentee voters who requested ballots on Friday. That would have made North Carolina the first state to send ballots to voters for the November 5 general election. As of Friday afternoon, more than 136,300 voters had requested absentee ballots statewide, including about 12,700 military and overseas voters.

In North Carolina, any eligible voter can request and vote an absentee ballot by mail. For more information on requesting, completing, and returning an absentee ballot, go to Vote By Mail. For additional information, see Detailed Instructions to Vote By Mail.

Voters who have already requested a ballot for the 2024 general election do not need to request a new one. If a voter needs their ballot to be delivered to a different address since they will receive their ballot later than expected, then a voter should complete a new request form with the updated address information. County boards of elections will process the new request once received and cancel the previous request and ballot.

The absentee ballot request deadline is 5 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 29. Election officials urge voters who wish to vote by mail to request their ballot as early as possible to ensure there is time to receive it and then send it back to their county board of elections so that it is received no later than 7:30 p.m. on Election Day – Nov. 5.

Note: State law previously provided for a grace period if a ballot was postmarked on or before Election Day and received up to three days after the election. That is no longer the case. The ballot must be at the county board office, not in the mail, by 7:30 p.m. on Election Day.

The cost for voters to mail back a ballot has increased to $1.77. Three Forever stamps (73 cents each) would cover this amount.

Sample Ballots
Because of the possible change to ballots, sample ballots were removed from the State Board’s Voter Search tool. New sample ballots will be posted as soon as they are available.

2024 General Election Dates and Deadlines
Here are key dates and deadlines for the 2024 general election in North Carolina:

• Oct. 11: Voter registration deadline (5 p.m.).*
• Oct. 17: In-person early voting begins; same-day registration available.
• Oct. 29: Absentee ballot request deadline (5 p.m.).*
• Nov. 2: In-person early voting ends (3 p.m.).
• Nov. 5: General Election Day.
• Nov. 5: Absentee ballot return deadline (7:30 p.m.).*

*Voter registration and absentee voting deadlines are different for military and overseas citizen voters.

ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS:

RALEIGH, NC. (AP) — A North Carolina appeals court on Friday ruled that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name must be taken off state ballots for president, upending plans in the battleground state just as officials were about to begin mailing out the nation’s first absentee ballots for the Nov. 5 presidential election.

The intermediate-level Court of Appeals issued an order granting Kennedy’s request to halt the mailing of ballots that included his name. The court also told a trial judge to order the State Board of Elections to distribute ballots without Kennedy’s name on them. No legal explanation was given.

State law otherwise required the first absentee ballots to be mailed or transmitted no later than 60 days before the general election, making Friday the deadline. The process of reprinting and assembling ballot packages likely would take more than two weeks, state attorneys have said. The ruling could be appealed.

Kennedy, the nominee of the We The People party in North Carolina, had sued last week to get off the state’s ballots after he suspended his campaign and endorsed Republican nominee Donald Trump. But the Democratic majority on the State Board of Elections rejected the request, saying it was too late in the process of printing ballots and coding tabulation machines. Kennedy then sued.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Rebecca Holt on Thursday denied Kennedy’s effort to keep his name off ballots, prompting his appeal. In the meantime, Holt told election officials to hold back sending absentee ballots until noon Friday.

A favorable outcome for Kennedy could assist Trump’s efforts to win the presidential battleground of North Carolina. Trump won the state’s electoral votes by just 1.3 percentage points over Democrat Joe Biden in 2020.

More than 132,500 people — military and overseas workers and in-state civilian residents — have requested North Carolina absentee ballots so far, the State Board of Elections said.

In an email, state board attorney Paul Cox told election directors in all 100 counties after Friday’s ruling to hold on to the current ballots but not send them. More than 2.9 million absentee and in-person ballots have been printed so far.

No decision has been made on appealing Friday’s decision, Cox wrote, and removing Kennedy and running mate Nicole Shanahan from the ballot would be “a major undertaking for everyone,” Cox wrote.

Since Kennedy suspended his campaign, the environmentalist and author has tried to get his name removed from ballots in several states where the race between Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris are expected to be close.

Kennedy on Wednesday sued in Wisconsin to get his name removed from the presidential ballot there after the state elections commission voted to keep him on it. Kennedy also filed a lawsuit in Michigan but a judge ruled Tuesday that he must remain on the ballot there.