A lawyer representing Kanye West’s presidential campaign is attempting to have Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring recused from a case that could push the rapper-turned-presidential candidate off the state’s ballot this November.
Christopher Kowalczuk filed the motion ahead of a Thursday afternoon hearing with the Richmond Circuit Court regarding West’s inclusion on the state ballot. Kowalczuk argued that statements by Herring, a Democrat, make him incapable of fairly representing the Virginia State Board of Elections.
“Given Mark Herring’s public statements indicating that he will side with his party’s efforts, and against the voters of Virginia, to deny Mr. West ballot access, he should immediately recuse himself from this case,” he said.
West’s campaign filed more than 5,000 signatures to the Virginia board of elections in a bid to get on the presidential ballot as an independent candidate. But two Virginians who appeared as electors argue they were misled by campaign volunteers for West during the signature-gathering process, and a prominent lawyer for Democrats, Marc Elias, filed a lawsuit on their behalf.
Kowalczuk accused Herring, who called for an emergency hearing to assess West’s ballot status, of attempting to keep a black man off the presidential ballot in an effort to “limit” the choice of voters.
“It is striking and ironic that Mark Herring would involve himself in an effort to deny an African-American a place on the ballot in Virginia given the current national conversation surrounding the disparate treatment of African-Americans in American society. This effort to limit voters’ choices in their presidential candidates is an anathema to the Republic and the Commonwealth of Virginia,” he said.
West has qualified to appear on the ballots of Oklahoma, Utah, Colorado, and several other states ahead of the November election. He received 2% support in a presidential poll conducted by Politico/Morning Consult in early August.
