By Allison Novelo
/ CBS News
Report: RFK Jr. faces sexual assault claim
Clear Choice Action, a Democrat-aligned super PAC aiming to hinder third-party presidential candidates, filed a lawsuit Thursday to keep Robert F. Kennedy Jr. off the ballot in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.
Kennedy is also facing challenges from the same super PAC in New York and Illinois. In New York, the PAC claims that Kennedy’s state nominating petition falsely listed a residence in New York City’s affluent northern suburbs, while he has in fact lived in the Los Angeles area since 2014. Kennedy testified in court Tuesday to dispute the lawsuit. In Illinois, the PAC filed an objection against his nominating petition. The matter is scheduled to be reviewed by the Illinois State Board of Elections on Aug. 23.
According to the PAC’s Pennsylvania petition, Kennedy falsified his home address on state paperwork, and the group argues that several pages of petition signatures should be disregarded because of “irregularities” with signatures. The super PAC also contends that Pennsylvania law required Kennedy to submit more signatures than he gathered. Kennedy’s campaign announced in June that it had submitted more than 9,000 signatures to the swing state, nearly double the required amount.
“All candidates for President of the United States must face the same scrutiny and meet the mandatory requirements for ballot access, yet time and time again across the country Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his We The People Party have misled voters, failed to meet legal requirements, and made a mockery of the democratic process,” said Pete Kavanaugh, founder of Clear Choice Action. “The bottom line is every candidate and party must play by the same set of rules.”
Democrat-aligned groups have expressed concern about Kennedy’s impact on the election, labeling him a spoiler candidate who could hand the victory to former President Trump by siphoning battleground-state voters away from the Democratic nominee.
In 2016, third-party candidate Jill Stein garnered nearly 50,000 votes in Pennsylvania, and Hillary Clinton ended up losing the crucial state to Trump by around 44,000 votes.
Kennedy’s campaign is determined to secure ballot access in all 50 states, and RFK Jr. has consistently stated he’s staying in the race to offer voters another option in November.
“We anticipated a challenge in Pennsylvania, the most highly contested swing state of the election. That’s why we collected four times as many signatures as required to get on the ballot — so many that the Democratic Party was unable to contest the signatures and was forced to cobble together a frivolous challenge to our petitioner affidavits instead,” said Stefanie Spear, press secretary to the Kennedy campaign. “We have won every ballot access legal challenge so far and look forward to defeating the DNC in Pennsylvania and giving the people of the Keystone State the option of voting for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. this fall.”
The office of the Pennsylvania secretary of state has not yet commented.
Allison Novelo is a 2024 campaign reporter for CBS News.
