NEWPORT, Ky. — The Kentucky Court of Appeals on Friday overturned a decision that removed Campbell County Commissioner Brian Painter from the November ballot.
Painter narrowly won renomination in the Republican primary last May, only to have his name removed from the November ballot after being found to have violated Kentucky’s electioneering laws by a judge in Louisville.
Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Charlie Cunningham, who heard the case, ruled that Dave Fischer would replace Painter as the Republican nominee. Painter had defeated Fischer at the polls, but Fischer later challenged Painter’s distribution of campaign materials inside the Campbell County Fiscal Court building where poll workers were attending a training. Cunningham agreed that the move violated election law.
RELATED | Campbell County commissioner's primary win vacated, opponent's name to be on ballot
But the Court of Appeals decision said, “Courts must not whittle away the elevated standard for setting aside election results.”
Fischer’s attorney, Steve Megerle, said they would file a motion for discretionary review with the Kentucky Supreme Court.
“This case was always going to be decided by the Kentucky Supreme Court,” Megerle said. “When the circuit court invalidated the primary results, it disenfranchised all Campbell County voters who had cast legal votes in the primary for the Republican nominee of the Campbell County Commissioner,” according to the COA opinion. “Accordingly, this judicial intervention shall not stand.”
Immediately after Cunningham’s decision, Painter’s attorneys and attorneys representing Campbell County Clerk Jim Luersen and the Board of Elections filed to appeal. The clerk and the BOE are represented separately from Painter. Both groups of attorneys have filed separate appeals. The Court of Appeals, however, combined the cases.
In an Aug. 18 filing, Jeff Mando, the attorney for Luersen and the BOE, was seeking oral arguments because it “will assist the court in applying the facts of this case to the unsettled interpretations of Kentucky’s prohibition on electioneering and vote buying, and it will serve the public interest,” Mando’s filing reads.
Further, Mando said that filings by attorney Steve Megerle, who is representing Fischer, are “littered with factual inaccuracies and blatant mischaracterizations of the record.”
Megerle disagreed.
“The Clerk and Board of Elections’ bombastically and baldly accuse Appellees of ‘factual inaccuracies’ and ‘blatant mischaracterizations of the record’ without a single example or reference,” Megerle said in his Aug. 22 filing.
The next step will be the Kentucky Supreme Court, where Megerle said he expects a quick decision because it could bump up against early voting in September.
This story originally appeared on LINK NKY. Click here for more.
READ MORE
Man accused of death of beloved Covington woman held on $1 million bond
Coalition calls for Victoria Square Apartments property owners to consider more 'equitable' plan
$115 million ‘transformational’ development to become Bellevue’s largest ever
