Hey, boys and girls! Do you want to let your State Representative, State Senator, or even your Congressperson know what you reallythink of them? Do you want to strike a blow for Liberty? Do you want to do battle with the cult of the omnipotent state?
Well, now’s your chance! For just 25 valid signatures, you, too, can become a Libertarian candidate for any of those three elected offices! But hurry, this is a limited-time offer! Signatures must be filed with the appropriate Board of Elections by December 18th.
But wait, there’s more! For just five valid signatures, you can become a candidate for a seat on the Libertarian Party of Ohio’s Central Committee. You can represent the Libertarians of your Congressional district and have a say on the people who will operate America’s third-largest political party.
But remember, these offers are only available for a limited time. The Libertarian Party of Ohio still retains the ballot access won by last year’s hard-fought petitioning campaign and will choose its candidates in next March’s statewide primary election. The deadline for filing is December 18, 2019.
You can collect signatures from any registered voter in Ohio who is not a registered Republican or Democrat. As party registration in Ohio follows voting in a partisan primary, to be eligible to sign your petition, the voter must not have voted in a Republican or Democratic primary in 2018 or 2019. All other voters are considered independents for the purposes of signing our petitions.
Have a friend who wants to sign but is not registered? No problem! Carry blank voter registration cards (available at your local BoE) with you and help them fill one out on the spot. Turn that in to the BoE in their home county, and, bang! they’re registered!
You can also get petition blanks from the BoE, or you can download and print them from the Ohio Secretary of State’s website. Congressional candidates must use petition form 2-E, candidates for State Senator or State Representative must use form 2-F, and Central Committee candidates must use form 2-K. The link to the petitions page of the Secretary of State’s website is below:
https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/elections-officials/forms-petitions/
The signature counts mentioned above are minimum requirements. The maximum allowed is three times the minimum, or 75 for Congress or State Legislature and 15 for Central Committee. Smart candidates usually shoot for twice the minimum. Your completed petitions must be filed by 5:00 pm December 18 with the Board of Elections of the county with the greatest number of voters in the appropriate district, Congressional district for Congress or Central Committee, and State Senate or State House districts for those offices. If you’re unsure of which county BoE you need to file with, your own county’s BoE can tell you, or contact the LPO.
So now’s your chance! Get those petitions, get those signatures, get them filed, and come next March, you, too, can vote for the perfect candidate: yourself!
