The Camden County Democratic Committee wants to intervene in a federal lawsuit filed by Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown) to abolish organization lines, saying it has “sufficient interest” in the litigation.
Kim and his co-plaintiffs, Democratic congressional candidates Carolyn Rush and Sarah Schoengood, claim that New Jersey’s unique bracketing and ballots position system violates their constitutional rights and that party endorsements come with a preferential ballot design that “nudges” primary election voters toward endorsed candidates.
“The basic argument is that political parties have a protected First Amendment freedom of association rights long recognized and upheld by the United States Supreme Court and that the New Jersey ballot structuring and bracketing laws have been long upheld by the New Jersey Supreme and Appellate Courts,” said Bill Tambussi, the longtime counsel to the Camden County Democrats.
Tambussi also points out that Kim’s legal team “simply ignores the way ballot draws are conducted in Camden County.”
According to Tambussi, U.S. Senate and gubernatorial candidates participate in the ballot draw for the first or primary ballot positions – a point that disputes allegations that Kim could wind up in what is commonly called “Ballot Siberia.”
He cited the following example: “Murphy files to run for Senate with a full slate, Kim files to run with a partial slate, Hamm files to run with no slate and Campos-Medina files to run with a partial slate, Murphy, Kim, Hamm, and Campos-Medina will all participate in a draw for columns one through four.”
“Once that draw is determined, the other candidates bracketed with the Senate candidates will fall in the respective columns,” Tambussi said. “At least in Camden County, each Senate candidate has the equal opportunity to secure by draw the first column while the bracketing protects the constitutionally protected rights of the political parties to associate.”
U.S. District Court Judge Zahid Quraishi has set a deadline of March 6 for motions to intervene.
“The arguments that apply only to down-ballot offices in years when there are no U.S. Senate or N.J. Gubernatorial candidates do not apply to the Kim lawsuit and are better left for decision in the Conforti lawsuit once discovery is complete,” Tambussi said. “That’s the argument the Camden County Democratic Committee will make when permitted to intervene.”
In his brief, Tambussi said that statistical analysis performed by some of Kim’s experts, including controversial Princeton University professor Sam Wang, is flawed. He particularly disagreed with a theory that the “display of information on a ballot can provide a visual heuristic which drives voter decisions and choice, ‘mak[ing] it easier for a voter to make choices listed first, clustered near one another, and/or arranged in an orderly line.”
“Plaintiffs’ hypothetical conjecture cannot eliminate the constitutionally protected associational rights afforded to CCDC as provided by the First and Fourteenth Amendments,” he argued.