Green Party Struck From Pennsylvania Ballots Over Paperwork Errors

Pennsylvania's Supreme Court has struck the Green Party from ballots, ruling that errors made in tits paperwork invalidated its candidates from appearing. That ruling will allow the state to distribute mail-in ballots, which had been halted pending the conclusion of the suit.

The Washington Post reported that the pause came just as election officials were preparing to send out requested mail-in ballots in response to massive demand spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic.

State rules require that signed filing papers be submitted in person, which Howie Hawkins and Angela walker neglected to do. Hawkins and Angela were substitutes for the original Green candidates, Elizabeth Scroggin and Neal Gale. The missing documents were affidavits from Scroggin and Gale.

This is the second time this week the Green Party has been removed from ballots after it was struck from Wisconsin’s. The party's efforts there were assisted by Republicans and a GOP law firm. Had the Pennsylvania court not removed the Green Party, millions of mail-in ballots would have needed to be reprinted.

The decision is a victory for Democrats, delivered down party lines with two Republican judges offering partial dissents. In 2016 the Green Party took more votes than Donald Trump’s margin of victory in both Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Green candidates are still on the ballot in more than two dozen other states.