(WASHINGTON) — Though Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced last month he was suspending his struggling independent campaign and endorsing former President Donald Trump, voters in many states are still likely to see him on their ballot this fall.
Announcing his decision in Phoenix, Arizona, Kennedy said that he would remove himself from the ballot in battleground states where he could act as a “spoiler” for Trump, but he encouraged voters in solidly Democratic or Republican states to vote for him.
Kennedy did not name the states from which he would withdraw, but ABC News has confirmed that he has successfully removed himself from several battleground state ballots.
However, in a hiccup for the campaign — and for Trump — Kennedy was unable to remove his name from the ballot in at least three states expected to be competitive: Michigan, Wisconsin and North Carolina.
Here’s a look at where Kennedy has been taken off from the ballot — and where he’ll still be on them.
Where has Kennedy been removed from the ballot?
As of Wednesday, ABC News had confirmed that Kennedy has successfully withdrawn his name from the ballot in at least 10 states: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Maine, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and South Carolina.
Many of those states are considered presidential battlegrounds, or at least contain some competitive congressional districts — such as Maine’s 2nd District, which Trump won in 2020, but is currently a seat held by Democratic Rep. Jared Golden.
Kennedy has moved quickly to scratch his name from ballots: in Arizona, his team scrambled to file withdrawal paperwork the night before he suspended his campaign. They were working to beat a crucial deadline: the Arizona secretary of state’s office was set to print ballots, which included Kennedy’s name, just hours later.
Then, in the hours after his announcement, Kennedy’s campaign successfully withdrew his name from the ballot in Texas, Pennsylvania and Ohio, ABC News confirmed.
In the days since, officials in several other states have told ABC News that Kennedy has successfully removed his name from the ballot.
In Georgia, a key battleground, the secretary of state’s office received two letters from lawyers for Kennedy asking to remove him from the ballot, according to a spokesperson.
But the office never considered Kennedy to be “on the ballot” in the first place — as an administrative judge ruled that the independent candidate did not meet the qualifications.
A spokesman for the office told ABC News, “He won’t be on the ballot.”
Officials in Nevada confirmed to ABC News last week that Kennedy is now off the ballot in the state — in that case, because of a court order received by the office.
The Nevada Independent reported that the court order is due to an agreement between Kennedy’s lawyers and the Nevada Democratic Party, which had challenged his petition to get on the ballot in Nevada, to drop the lawsuit and to mutually agree that Kennedy should not be on the ballot.
In New Hampshire, the office of the secretary of state confirmed to ABC News that Kennedy’s campaign submitted signatures to get him on the ballot the morning he suspended his campaign. But days later, a spokesperson for the office told ABC News that the Kennedy campaign “withdrew the nomination petitions required to be a certified candidate on the general election ballot.”
Where is Kennedy still on the ballot?
As of Wednesday, ABC News had confirmed that Kennedy will likely be on the ballot in about 30 states, although this could shift with any further successful withdrawals, legal challenges or decisions by elections offices ahead of state ballot certifications.
That number includes battleground states whose ballots Kennedy tried in recent days to withdraw from, such as Wisconsin, Michigan and North Carolina.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission voted 5-1 on Tuesday to certify Kennedy and some other independent candidates for the ballot. The board debated over whether to remove him given his withdrawal from the race, with commissioner Ann S. Jacobs, a Democratic Party appointee on the board, arguing that Kennedy could not withdraw due to state statutes.
“It literally says, ‘if you filed nomination papers you cannot withdraw unless you’re dead.’ I mean, all of this is just vibing to try to ignore a statute. And this statute’s clear — like this isn’t even equivocal,” Jacobs said during a meeting of the commission.
A lawyer for Kennedy had submitted a letter to the Wisconsin Elections Commission requesting to withdraw him from the state’s ballot. But a spokesperson for the commission told ABC News recently that if a candidate files to get on the ballot in Wisconsin, “there is no mechanism to ‘take back’ the filing.”
ABC News has reached out to the Kennedy campaign to see if he plans to appeal the decision.
In Michigan, a judge ruled against Kennedy, who had sued Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson for ordering his name to remain on the ballot.
Nominees of minor political parties may not remove themselves from the ballot, a representative for Benson’s office told ABC News.
The Natural Law Party, a two-member political party with ballot access in Michigan, nominated Kennedy to lead its ticket in April.
And in North Carolina, election officials voted to keep Kennedy’s name on the ballot since nearly two million ballots had already been printed across the state.
Reprinting them would be costly and leave most counties without ballots until at least mid-September (under state law, absentee ballots must go out by Sept. 6 to voters who have requested them).
On Friday, Kennedy sued the North Carolina Board of Elections to get his name removed from the ballot.
In an oddity, there are also some states where Kennedy’s campaign filed to get on the ballot even after he announced suspending his campaign.
Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams wrote on X on Monday afternoon that Kennedy filed to run in Kentucky (a state that his campaign had not discussed much or at all previously) that afternoon.
“Having just completed review of his submission of signatures, we are placing him on the ballot,” Adams wrote. The Kentucky secretary of state’s website also shows his filing.
And in Oregon, Kennedy achieved a spot on the ballot three days after announcing his suspension through the We the People Party and “at this time” will be on the ballot in the state, a spokesman for the Oregon secretary of state’s office said. The Oregon secretary of state’s website also has an entry for his filing.
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