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Nos. 56 & 58
candidate be denied access to the ballot for technical defects that do not relate to the fairness
of the process under such extraordinary conditions. Ms. Seawright’s corrected submissions
in these extreme circumstances should not prevent her from remaining on the ballot in the
June primary.
B.
Although the majority perceives a conflict between the First Department’s
reasoning and the reasoning of the Third Department in Ms. Hawatmeh’s case, those cases
are readily distinguishable based on the different conditions prevailing in March 2020 in
New York City and Pleasant Valley, New York, whence Ms. Hawatmeh hails; or based on
the differences in the candidates’ physical conditions. The absence of any genuine conflict,
and with it the absence of any reason to retain leave in these cases, is further underscored
by the fact that Ms. Hawatmeh’s designating petition for the Conservative Party was timely
filed. The Third Department’s conclusion that Ms. Hawatmeh’s petition was untimely
because it was not “postmarked prior to midnight of the last day of filing” is incorrect on
the face of Election Law § 1-106 (1) (Matter of Hawatmeh v New York State Board of
Elections, 2020 NY Slip Op 02907, *1-2 [3d Dept May 15, 2020]).
ensures that all voters will have their choice of candidate on the ballot. The majority,
however, comes to the opposite conclusion: its interpretation of the recent enactments
penalizes candidates for technical defects in completely anomalous circumstances and
suggests that the legislature intended to “abort candidacies and disenfranchise voters” (see
Hogan v Goodspeed, 196 AD2d 675, 678 [3d Dept 1993]). That is surely not the case;
rather, these recent enactments were intended to allow the primary elections to proceed
with as much participation as possible under the circumstances.
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