Jeff Amason Calls For Emergency Court Hearing For Ballot Access

Staff Report

Jeff Amason, the Libertarian candidate who wants to challenge incumbent Republican Scot Turner for the House District 21 seat, has filed an emergency request with the Fulton County Superior Court to set the hearing to decide if he can be placed on the Nov. 4 ballot.

Amason said he wants the hearing to be held as soon as possible “due to the very limited time frame available before paper absentee ballots have to be printed.”

Interim Cherokee County Elections Supervisor Kim Stancil has told Amason the printing deadline for the November ballot is noon Aug. 29.

“With the looming deadline less than a month away, we need the court to prioritize this case and resolve this issue quickly to meet the printing deadline set by the state,” Amason said in a statement. “Our campaign followed the letter of the law and collected more than enough valid signatures as verified by the Board of Elections. We hope that the court will recognize the conflicting nature of these two statutes and allow the 1,827 registered voters who signed the petitions to have their voices heard. It will not serve the people of this state or democracy as a whole to restrict the will of people over a clerical matter.”

The Georgia Secretary of State’s Office last month disqualified his petition to be placed on the Nov. 4 general election ballot.

Jared Thomas, a spokesperson for the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, cited Georgia code section 21-2-170 as the reason why the agency disqualified Amason’s petition.

The code stipulates no notary public can sign a petition as an elector or serve as a circulator of a petition he or she has notarized.

Thomas noted Amason’s wife served as a notary on many of the petition’s pages. She, along with another person who also notarized the petition, also served as petition circulator and signed the petition.

“The law states that any pages notarized by a person who also circulated and/or signed the petition have to be disqualified,” Thomas added.

Amason wants to run for the district that represents Holly Springs, Hickory Flat and portions of Canton and southeast Cherokee County in the State House of Representatives. 

State election rules dictate Amason, as well as any third-party or independent candidate, have to get 5 percent of signatures from registered voters in the district who were eligible to vote in 2012.

(Photo credit: Sherwin Lee)