Summary
The Minnesota Supreme Court denied Jay Fosle’s petition seeking placement of his name on the November 2012 general-election ballot for Minnesota House District 7B. The court held that Fosle had no statutory basis for appearing on the ballot as an independent or unaffiliated candidate because he had not filed a timely nominating petition. The court also rejected his equal-protection and fairness arguments, although it agreed that he should have been served with an earlier ballot-access petition.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether Fosle had a statutory basis for having his name placed on the November 2012 general-election ballot as an independent candidate or without party affiliation.
- Whether equal protection required that Fosle be placed on the ballot because Simonson, another former write-in candidate, was placed on the ballot.
- Whether the failure to serve Fosle with the prior ballot-preparation petition required the court to add Fosle's name to the ballot.
Holdings
- Fosle was not entitled to have his name placed on the ballot because he had neither shown endorsement by the Independence Party nor complied with the statutory petition-nomination requirements applicable to candidates who do not seek a major-party nomination.
- Equal protection did not require placing Fosle's name on the ballot because Fosle and Simonson were not similarly situated after Simonson became the DFL-endorsed candidate and Fosle remained an unaffiliated write-in candidate.
- A scheduling order requiring service on all candidates for an office includes individuals who formally requested that their write-in votes be counted, but the failure to serve Fosle did not entitle him to placement on the ballot.
Key quotations
“Placing Fosle’s name on the ballot, with or without party affiliation, would be contrary to state statute.” (621)
“Equal protection of the laws therefore does not require us to order that Fosle’s name be placed on the November 2012 general election ballot.” (622)
Factual background
Fosle did not file during the June 2012 filing period for the office of state representative in District 7B, but he filed the required written request that write-in votes for him be counted. After the DFL revoked Gauthier's nomination and endorsed Simonson, the court ordered Simonson substituted for Gauthier on the general-election ballot. Fosle had not been served with the petition in that proceeding and sought to have his own name added to the ballot as an independent candidate or without party affiliation.
Procedural history
After the court granted a separate petition in Martin v. Dicklich ordering the replacement of DFL nominee Kerry Gauthier with Erik Simonson on the ballot, Fosle petitioned to have his own name added because he had not been served with the Martin petition. The court concluded that Fosle had no statutory or constitutional entitlement to ballot placement and denied his petition.