Judge Blocks Party Bosses' Attempt To Boot Candidates From Ballot

MAMARONECK, NY — A New York Supreme Court Judge has ruled that the names of three Democrats will remain on the primary ballot after the names were removed at the behest of local party officials.

The three reform Democrats went to court Friday morning to keep their names on the June 28, Democratic primary ballot for Village of Mamaroneck Trustee. Lou Young, Leilani Yizar-Reid and Manny Rawlings were knocked off the ballot Monday after the Village of Mamaroneck Democratic Committee disallowed signatures on the candidates' nominating petitions based on technicalities.

The committee is running its own "official" slate of candidates. Those candidates were pointedly not endorsed by Democrat Mayor Tom Murphy, who cited a "strong appearance of conflict" among party bosses' preferred candidates.

"I just want to congratulate my friends Manny Rawlings, Lou Young and Leilani Yizar-Reid for winning in court today their right to be on the Democratic Primary ballot," Murphy said in a statement released shortly after Friday's ruling. "Democracy triumphs over back room party shenanigans."

If the ruling by the Westchester County Board of Elections had been allowed to stand, the decision would have allowed the committee to avoid a primary altogether and would have removed the only Black candidates in the race and an incumbent from the ballot.

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Three of five trustee seats are open this election cycle.

The petition challenge, signed by village party functionaries Robert Stark and Greta Heaney, sought to disqualify all 387 signatures on the nominating ballots for Young, Yizar-Reid and Rawlings. The Board of Elections denied most of the committee’s challenges but upheld 124 signature objections on mostly technical grounds like listing the office being sought as "Board of Trustees" instead of "Village Trustee."

The ruling left the Young-Yizar-Reid-Rawlings ticket with 263 unimpeachable signatures, 13 short of the amount required by law.

"We’ll be able to show a judge that the people who signed our petitions knew what they were signing and did so enthusiastically,” Lou Young said Thursday before heading to court. "These voters should not be disenfranchised because of a cynical use of technicalities. In this primary election we are literally fighting Democrats who don’t believe in democracy."

Leilani Yizar-Reid says the petition challenge proves their opponents are afraid of facing the voters.

"I am very saddened by how the Democratic Committee has chosen to handle this whole situation," Yizar-Reid said in a statement. "I am a registered Democrat in this community and when I humbly declined their endorsement, I was no longer accepted as a Democrat in Mamaroneck. Some members of the committee use it as a platform to pursue their own personal vendettas."

Running mate Lou Young said the move by his own party's bosses was punitive and self-serving rather than in the interests of voters.

"Leilani and Manny were bold enough to run for office without agreeing to kiss the committee ring," Young said. "This is an ugly attempt to 'put them back in their place.'"

Manny Rawlings, the youngest of the three candidates (the campaign slogan is “Three generations, one village”) called on all trustee candidates from all parties to disavow the petition challenge as an attack on open democracy.

"Candidates for public office should not be allowed to hide behind surrogates and hidden operatives," Rawlings said. "We desperately need transparency in this village and an end to cronyism."

In the end, those decisions will now once again be up to the voters.