Attorney General Matt Platkin has filed an amicus brief arguing that the three elected members of the Cherry Hill Democratic County Committee should fill the 71 vacant seats and not allow the Camden County Democratic organization slate to play any role, a move that will undoubtedly escalate the war between Platkin and South Jersey powerbroker George E. Norcross III.
Cherry Hill elects its county committee members at large in a winner-take-call situation where one single vote is cast for an entire slate. In the June 10 Democratic primary, a South Jersey Progressive Democrats slate of three candidates for the 74 seats defeated the 74 organization-backed candidates, 5,547 to 3,350.
On June 23, Superior Court Judge Michael Kassal signed a temporary restraining order to prevent the winners – Susan Druckenbrod, Rena Margulis, and David Stahl – from meeting, organizing, adopting by-laws changes, or attempting to fill the 71 vacant seats.
The Democratic organization maintains that the winning slate didn’t include enough candidates to have a quorum to organize, pointing to the party bylaws that require 30% of the county committee to be in attendance.
“The text of New Jersey’s election laws is clear: vacancies on municipal party committees must be filled by the ‘remaining members’ of the municipal party committee,” Platkin and his team wrote in a brief.
In a lawsuit filed last month, attorney William Tambussi argued that U.S. District Court Judge Zahid Quraishi’s ruling last year that ended county lines made it impossible to place “ovals” adjacent to the name of each of the 74 candidates because the voting machines could not accommodate individual votes for each contender.
Platkin argues that voters chose to cast their vote for a slate of three and to leave the other 71 seats vacant. He said the statute anticipated such an issue.
“That rule, enacted by the legislature, effectuates the intent of voters by allowing the officeholders elected by voters to fill vacancies where those vacancies arise because there is an incomplete slate of candidates,” the attorney general’s filing stated. “A contrary rule would vitiate voters’ preferences, rendering meaningless the decision made by the majority of Cherry Hill voters to select the bubble that filled three seats, necessarily leaving 71 seats vacant on the municipal committee.”
The organization also maintains that the ballot violates a new state law that prohibited “Ballot Siberia,” the practice of placing candidates at the end of an extended amount of white space on the ballot, making them difficult to find.
While Camden County elects municipal county committee members-at-large – some counties require each candidate to run in their district – voting machines don’t permit an individual vote to be cast for each candidate.
Platkin’s brief argues that Camden County Democrats “seek to rewrite the rules of the election after the rules were already set, votes already cast, and winners already declared.”
“This court should reject that rear-guard action retroactively challenging the settled rules of the road established under New Jersey law,” the attorney general’s brief noted. To overthrow the expressed will of a large number of voters for no fault of their own … would in many cases defeat the paramount object of the election laws.”
He believes the court should not disrupt established rules for the filling of vacancies after the election has been completed.
“No law requires a full slate of candidates to run for office. No law requires that losers of an election be retroactively installed into public or party office through some back-door. The law is clear, and unambiguous,” said Yael Bromberg, an attorney who represents the progressive slate. “What becomes clear, after the recitation of the applicable law across the nation, and in New Jersey, once all is stripped away, is that the Plaintiffs are endeavoring a blatant power grab. Thankfully, we do not live in an autocratic state, and our laws and constitution direct otherwise.”
In a filing today, Tambussi stated that the argument by the progressives overlooks the fact that their lack of a quorum prevents them from taking any action.
“The Progressives fail to cite a single case that supports their desired result,” Tambussi wrote. “the numerous certifications the Progressives offer are filled with personal grievances that have no bearing on the current dispute, rely almost entirely upon hearsay and the personal opinions of others, and do not contain actual facts within the personal knowledge of the certifiers.”
Tambussi maintains that it is “well settled that political parties are given wide latitude to regulate and manage their internal affairs,”
“The CCDC has done just that in this case by setting a quorum requirement for business to be conducted,” he said. “This requirement has been historically adopted by the Cherry Hill Democratic Committee as well, and cannot be changed in the absence of a quorum.”
Oral arguments are set for July 11.
“In light of the Attorney General’s strong interest in ensuring the proper interpretation of New Jersey state statutes governing elections, and because the questions presented in this case are of substantial public importance, the attorney general seeks leave to appear as amicus curiae and respectfully urges the court to deny plaintiffs’ requested relief,” the filing states.
Platkin has been battling Norcross on several fronts for the last few years, starting with the appointment of a task force to investigate the role of the Democratic leader obtaining tax breaks from the New Jersey Economic Development Authority while he was Gov. Phil Murphy’s chief counsel.
Last year, as attorney general, Platkin announced a sweeping 112-page racketeering indictment against Norcross and others. In February, Superior Court Judge Peter Warshaw dismissed all of the charges, finding that the allegations did not constitute extortion or criminal coercion. Platkin has filed an appeal.