State admits it stopped enforcing petition law as GOP fights to keep Libertarian off NJ-7 ballot

New Jersey election officials stopped enforcing a law requiring petition circulators to live in the state, a practice now at the center of a federal court fight over whether Libertarian congressional candidate Lana Leguía can appear on the November ballot in the closely watched race for Congress in New Jersey’s 7th District.

Leguía says she relied on the state’s longstanding policy when three New York residents collected most of the signatures supporting her candidacy.  Republicans say the state had no authority to ignore the law and want election officials to explain why the residency requirement went unenforced.

The policy followed a 2021 federal court ruling that allowed an out-of-state presidential candidate to use out-of-state circulators for New Jersey primary-election petitions.  The judge found the state’s requirement unconstitutional as applied to the candidate and circulators who brought that case.

The decision, Arsenault v. Way, involved a different law from the one governing Leguía’s general-election petitions.  It did not broadly invalidate every New Jersey residency requirement or directly address independent and third-party candidates seeking access to the general-election ballot.

But New Jersey election officials interpreted the ruling as a reason to stop enforcing residency requirements for both primary and general-election petition circulators.

“The Secretary has not enforced (the statute’s) residency requirement in the years following Arsenault,” Deputy Attorney General Nathaniel Rubin wrote in an August 21 court filing.

The acknowledgment could help determine whether Leguía joins Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-Westfield), Democratic challenger Rebecca Bennett and independent candidate Seamus Patrick O’Toole on the general-election ballot.

U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi has scheduled a hearing for Tuesday at 10 a.m. in Trenton and expects to rule by August 31.  He has temporarily prevented the state from omitting Leguía from the ballot while the case proceeds.

Leguía submitted 759 signatures before the June 2 deadline, and election officials accepted 755. Independent and third-party congressional candidates need 250 valid signatures.

But three New York residents collected 670 signatures.  Without those signatures, Leguía had just 85, leaving her 165 short.

The New Jersey Republican State Committee challenged her petitions, arguing that state law requires general-election petition circulators to be eligible New Jersey voters, including being residents of the state.

Administrative Law Judge William Courtney agreed that the signatures collected by the New York circulators should be rejected.  But he said he could not decide whether the residency requirement was constitutional.

Lt. Gov. Dale Caldwell, acting as secretary of state, overruled Courtney and restored Leguía to the ballot.

Caldwell concluded that the reasoning of the 2021 federal decision should extend to independent and third-party candidates.  He found no meaningful reason to allow out-of-state circulators to work for candidates seeking major-party nominations while prohibiting them from collecting signatures for candidates petitioning directly onto the general-election ballot.

The Appellate Division disagreed, finding that Caldwell could not disregard an existing state law without evidence that he had received and relied on legal advice from the attorney general.

“Here, the record lacks any evidence that the Secretary received and relied on the advice of the AG in declining to apply N.J.S.A. 19:13-7,” Judges Jessica Mayer and Robert Vinci wrote in their July 31 ruling.

The judges ordered Leguía removed from the ballot but did not decide whether the residency requirement was constitutional.

The New Jersey Supreme Court declined to hear her appeal on August 7 and rejected a request for reconsideration four days later.

Leguía then sued Caldwell in federal court, arguing that the residency requirement violates constitutional protections for political speech and unfairly burdens independent candidates.

She also argues that she should not be penalized for following a practice accepted by state election officials for approximately five years.

“Plaintiff will show that she received no notice before the filing deadline that the State would reverse that practice and that, had she been given such notice, she could and would have used New Jersey-resident circulators and obtained sufficient qualifying signatures,” her attorneys wrote.

By the time Republicans challenged her petitions, the deadline to submit additional signatures had already passed.

“Otherwise-valid signatures of New Jersey voters were invalidated because of the residence of the persons who circulated the petitions, after the petition deadline had passed and plaintiff no longer had an opportunity to alter her conduct or cure the asserted deficiency,” Leguía’s attorneys wrote.

The state’s position is unusual.

Caldwell believes Leguía should appear on the ballot and says the state acted properly when it stopped enforcing the residency requirement after the 2021 federal decision.

But his attorneys also argue that the residency requirement itself is constitutional and that Leguía’s First and Fourteenth Amendment claims should fail.

The state’s preferred argument is based on how the two election laws fit together.  One law governs circulators working for major-party primary candidates; the other applies to independent and third-party candidates seeking direct access to the general-election ballot.

Caldwell’s attorneys argue that the Legislature intended the two groups to be treated equally. Once the primary-election restriction became unenforceable, they contend, the state should not continue imposing comparable restrictions only on candidates who do not participate in a major-party primary.

Republicans say the laws are separate and that a narrow federal ruling concerning a presidential primary did not erase the general-election residency requirement.

“At best, Arsenault could only apply to similarly situated presidential candidates and the circulators working for them; not every candidate for public office in New Jersey as plaintiff contends,” Republican attorneys Maureen Coghlan and Jason Sena wrote.

They also argue that the primary-election law considered in the earlier case was more restrictive because it required circulators to be registered New Jersey voters.  The statute governing general elections requires circulators to be eligible voters, which includes residency but does not require actual registration.

“Arsenault never considered the constitutionality of a requirement that circulators of direct nominating petitions be voter eligible,” the committee wrote.

Republicans also point to Leguía’s political history.

“Plaintiff appeared on the general election ballot as a congressional candidate in 2024 and a state legislative candidate in 2025 as a result of petitions supported entirely by in-state circulators,” their brief says.

The GOP argues that her prior success undermines her claim that limiting circulators to New Jersey residents makes it too difficult for an independent candidate to qualify.

Leguía says the opposite: her previous petition drives show she could have complied this year if the state had warned her that it was changing the practice candidates had followed for years.

Republicans also contend that Quraishi lacks authority to overturn the Appellate Division’s ruling effectively.

They rely on a rule that generally prevents federal trial judges from serving as appellate courts for state-court decisions.  The GOP says Leguía’s injury came from the state appellate ruling and that restoring her candidacy would effectively reverse it.

“Plaintiff’s requested injunctive relief effectively reverses the Appellate Division’s order deeming plaintiff ineligible to appear on the ballot,” the GOP brief says.

Leguía maintains that the state courts never decided her federal constitutional claims and that Quraishi can resolve those unanswered questions without functioning as an appellate judge.

Another dispute involves county clerks, who oversee ballot preparation and candidate placement.

Republicans argue that Caldwell cannot put Leguía back on the ballot by himself because the county clerks responsible for preparing the 7th District ballots are not defendants in the lawsuit.

“If plaintiff seeks an order to appear on the general election ballot, she must obtain an order forcing the County Clerks to do so, not the Secretary who has no legal authority over the process,” the committee wrote.

The parties are also fighting over whether the state must produce an election official to explain why the residency requirement was not enforced.

Republicans say Quraishi directed the state to provide someone familiar with the law and its application in primary and general elections.

“The state’s refusal to comply with the court’s order prevents the parties from developing a record, the Court from analyzing the claims asserted by plaintiff and the defendant-intervenor from responding to those claims,” the GOP wrote.

Caldwell’s attorneys say such testimony is unnecessary because the main questions can be resolved by examining the statutes and previous court decisions.

“The Secretary does not believe that testimony about the enforcement history or non-enforcement history of (the statute’s) residency requirement is relevant to the merits of plaintiff’s constitutional arguments,” Rubin wrote.

Witnesses expected at Tuesday’s hearing include Leguía, petition circulator Geoff Sebesta, veteran Green Party activists Barry Bender and Steven Welzer, an unidentified voter who signed Leguía’s petition and Assemblyman Al Barlas (R-Cedar Grove), the Essex County Republican chairman.

Last year, Sebesta, who said he lived in Kentucky, was a paid circulator for Green Party gubernatorial candidate Lily Benavides.

Wade Hale is expected to testify about the deadline for preparing the 7th district ballot and whether it can be delayed.

Leguía received 3,784 votes when she ran for Congress in 2024.  Kean defeated Democratic nominee Sue Altman that year by 23,306 votes.

Kean is seeking a third term against Bennett, a former Navy helicopter pilot, in a race expected to help determine control of the House. O’Toole is running under the slogan “Stop Israel’s Genocide.”

Quraishi expects to decide Leguía’s ballot status by August 31, less than three weeks before vote-by-mail ballots are scheduled to begin going out on September 19.  An appeal could further compress that timetable.