Who paid to put Cornel West on the Maine presidential ballot – and why?

Former Harvard professor Cornel West speaks in Cambridge, Massachusetts on October 22, 2019. AP Photo/Elise Amendola, file photo

On Wednesday, a mystery came to light during the debate over the eligibility of former Harvard professor Cornel West to run for president in Maine.

Who hired the people to collect signatures that were submitted to the state to qualify West as a third-party candidate? And why did they go to the trouble and expense?

Representatives of the West campaign said they had not paid anyone to collect signatures here, nor were they aware of any outside group doing so, nor had they received any signature collection as a campaign donation.

But Democratic Rep. Grayson Lookner of Portland told the Press Herald on Thursday that he was one of the people paid by an outside organization, National Ballot Access, to collect signatures for West. And he said he stopped doing so after learning that the petitions could be linked to Republican efforts to siphon support for Democrats by backing third-party candidates to put Donald Trump back in the White House.

“I support what Cornel West stands for,” Lookner said of the progressive candidate. “We have ranked choice voting in Maine, so I thought his name should be on the ballot for a number of reasons, including his stance on Gaza. When I found out where the money was coming from, I didn't feel comfortable and quit.”

Lookner said he did not know directly who exactly funded the petition, but said he learned from national news that Trump supporters were backing third-party candidates to pull support from President Joe Biden when he was still the presumptive Democratic nominee and in a tough fight for re-election.

Biden has since withdrawn his candidacy and Vice President Kamala Harris has been chosen as the Democratic candidate – a move that turned the previously static presidential campaign between two unpopular candidates on its head.

It is not illegal for campaign teams or outside groups to pay poll workers, but depending on the circumstances, such expenses may need to be reported as a campaign contribution.

The Associated Press reported last month on secret groups and Republican donors funding campaigns for West and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The AP reviewed government emails showing that Blitz Canvassing, a Republican firm that received millions from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, funded signature drives in North Carolina, but it was unable to determine who provided the funds.

The question of whether outside groups are funding petition drives in Maine came up Wednesday when Secretary of State Shenna Bellows held a hearing here on two separate challenges to West's candidacy.

West's campaign manager, Ceyanna Dent, said Wednesday that the campaign has not paid anyone to distribute petitions in Maine, nor has it worked with third parties that have submitted petitions. But she acknowledged that it's possible that a third party hired people without the campaign's knowledge.

“I'm not sure there's a connection between the decentralized nature of our process and the ability for third parties to support an independent campaign, but I think it's also fair to say that it's possible because of the decentralized nature of our petition collection process,” Dent said.

Matt Warner, an attorney representing two people challenging West's eligibility to vote, read a list of eight people's names, including Lookner, who had collected signatures for West and who had registered with the state and paid mailers for previous state-level election and referendum campaigns.

One of those people, Patrick Powers, is the owner of New England Petitioning (LCC), a Massachusetts-based company that hires people to distribute petitions for state-level referendums and ballot issues.

Alex Coronado, West's campaign organizing director, said he did not know anyone on the list – nor did he know of any outside groups funding petition efforts in other states.

“I'm not aware of anyone in particular,” Coronado said. “I'm definitely not aware of anyone paying anyone to do this work. I'm definitely aware of the difficulties we've had in not being able to pay people. I'm even more aware of that.”

A phone number for New England Petitioning was unanswered Thursday.

Warner also presented Secretary of State Shenna Bellows with state registrations of other professional signature gathering firms, including National Ballot Access, Ballot Access Management, LLC, Revolution Field Strategies and State Senator Ben Chipman, listing individuals who were paid to collect signatures in support of marijuana legalization in 2015.

Chipman said he was not involved in the campaign in the West, but signed a petition.

Warner could not be reached Thursday to discuss the significance of that evidence or explain why he spent so much time pursuing that question, even though it was not among the substantive objections to West's petitions.

These appeals allege that the distributors submitted too many signatures in violation of state law, listed thousands of signatures that should have been invalid, and that the number of signatures required to qualify for the ballot was insufficient.

They also claim that people were deceived when signing the petition. Several witnesses said Wednesday that they were told the petition was about banning stock trading by federal officials and that West was never mentioned in the signatories.

The challenges appear to be part of a nationwide effort by Clear Choice Action, a group led by Biden allies to prevent a third party from messing up what is expected to be a very close election. The Washington Post reported that the group plans to “conduct research and push storylines in the media” to discourage people from voting for third-party candidates.

Attorneys for West and the plaintiffs are expected to submit their closing arguments in writing by 5 p.m. Friday. Bellows has five business days to issue a decision, which can then be appealed to the Supreme Court.

Copy the story link