White House hopefuls Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and Bernie Sanders are eligible to participate in New Hampshire’s Feb. 9 primary, the state’s Ballot Law Commission ruled Tuesday.
Trump and Cruz, both of whom are vying for the GOP nomination, and Sanders, a Democratic hopeful, faced separate challenges regarding their eligibility to participate in the Granite State’s fast-approaching nominating contest.
In early November, New Hampshire resident Carmen Elliott filed a complaint with New Hampshire’s secretary of state concerning Cruz’s constitutional presidential eligibility.
According to his complaint, Elliott claimed Cruz is ineligible to be on the state’s Republican primary ballot “because he is not a natural born citizen, as he was not born in the jurisdiction of the United States;” while the Texas senator was born in Canada, having an American mother granted Cruz U.S. citizenship at birth.
A source familiar with the hearing’s outcome has since confirmed to the Washington Examiner that the complaint against Cruz was tossed out Tuesday by New Hampshire’s BLC. Elliott filed a similar complaint against Arizona Sen. John McCain, born in Panama, when McCain ran for president in 2008.
A complaint against Sanders, who filed to participate in the state’s Democratic primary, was also thrown out Tuesday. In his initial complaint, Republican New Hampshire resident Andy Martin contended that Sanders couldn’t run as a Democrat in the first-in-the-nation primary state because he was elected to the U.S. Senate as an independent.
“Certainly in so far as candidates are concerned in New Hampshire, party affiliation is not like a flag of convenience or change of underwear (to use Mr. Sanders’ own phraseology),” Martin wrote in his complaint.
The BLC also dismissed a complaint against Trump that was filed by former New Hampshire Republican Party Chairman Fergus Cullen. Cullen claimed Trump’s expression of policies and positions that many consider “inconsistent with the Republican Party platform and the Republican Party of New Hampshire’s statement of principles and bylaws” rendered him ineligible to appear on the party’s primary ballot.
Cullen’s complaint was unanimously dismissed by the commission, which cited Trump’s registration as a Republican in New York as enough of a reason to approve his place on the ballot.
Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, previously said the billionaire’s supporters would “riot in the streets” if the leading GOP candidate was removed from the ballot.
