[LPIL - Board of Directors] LP IL v. Cook County Clerk - Response

[treasurer at lpillinois.org]

To the board and Cook County Board Candidates:

 

We will be filing a rebuttal to the Clerk’s argument on Friday.  I want to
provide a synopsis, as best I could, of her response to our suit.

 

Clerk Yarbrough responded to our complaint with a three fold argument.

 

1.	She has not rejected our nomination papers so there is no reason for
a decision at this time

a.	She didn’t violate our first amendment rights because we haven’t
turned in petitions yet (ie. Speech)
b.	The districts haven’t voted for board seats since redistricting so
they haven’t had “their say”.

2.	A Balance of Harms Analysis (legal test for court test) shows that
plaintiffs cannot establish they have been harmed.
3.	The LP IL failed to prove that we are being withheld due process as
our county board candidates can file for the General Election as “New
Party”.

 

As to the first point, Clerk Yarbrough did not publish signature numbers
for county board seats nor Township Committeemen.  This implies that she
does not feel compelled that we are “Established” for those districts.
Email exhibits with the Clerk’s office also state that.  As “Established
Party” status determines when the political party gathers signatures and
turns in petitions, this is a very salient point.  If we are not
established, we must petition during the “New Party” period.  The districts
argument carries no water as a prior decision (Ramierez) finds that the
signature count MUST be based off the highest total of votes in the last
general election, not when the specific district contest was held.  Ramierez
was a decision in favor of the Chicago BOE, a close ally of the clerk.
Scholz, our decision we base our full ballot access upon, makes no
distinction on subordinate units of government.  If you are established in
the county, you are established for ALL political subdivisions. We are not
arguing over whether or not Cook County may redistrict the board seats.  We
stipulate that as our ballot access flows from a countywide political
contest, all political subdivisions of Cook County are contained in the
county by statute and we must be granted “Established Party” ballot access
under Scholz.

 

As to Balance of Harms, Andrew (our Attorney) believes we have not only
been harmed but defamed as the clerk chose NOT to calculate the signature
requirements for the county board seats since they were so kind to tally
election results for us by new board district in the responding brief.
Basically, she admits that signature calculations could be done and
published but were not at her discretion.  She is bound to hold a primary
for the LP IL anyways as we have countywide candidates running in that
primary which she admits we are “Established” for.

 

On the third point, we would be harmed if our candidates were forced to
file under “New Party” rules as there is a different, and much higher,
signature requirement to file directly for the General Election.  Not only
would we be required to gather more, we would be prevented from using the
signatures we have already received as they were not given to us in the
proper time period, nor on the correct petition form.  This point is
ludicrous.

 

Andrew, if I missed anything in the summation, please let me know.

 

Russ Clark
Treasurer

Libertarian Party of Illinois

 

From: Andrew Finko <FinkoLaw at Fastmail.FM> 
Sent: Wednesday, February 16, 2022 8:00 PM
To: executivedirector at lpillinois.org; treasurer at lpillinois.org
Cc: Steve Suess <Chair at lpillinois.org>; Adam Balling
<adamballing at hotmail.com>
Subject: Clerk's Response

 

FYI- just downloaded and will be reading shortly. 

Let me know any suggestions and arguments or comments.

Andrew Finko 

- - -
Andrew Finko
166 W. Washington St. 
Suite 400
Chicago, IL 60602
Ph (773) 480-0616
Fx (773) 453-3266
Em FinkoLaw at Fastmail.FM <mailto:FinkoLaw at Fastmail.FM>  

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