Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is still trying to force officials in North Carolina to remove him from the ballot — and it's threatening to blow up the early voting schedule.
North Carolina, which could be a closely contested state this year, has some of the earliest early voting in the nation, with the first ballots intended to go out this week.
According to CNN, following the state Board of Elections' denial of his request to be removed from the ballot, he filed a lawsuit to try to force his removal. A Wake County judge denied Kennedy's request Thursday, but ordered a pause to allow him to appeal. In her order, the judge told the state to pause mailing absentee ballots before noon Friday.
“The court can find no practical, personal or pecuniary harm to the plaintiff should his name remain on the ballot,” said Judge Becky Holt. “The defendant, however, would have to reprint the ballots at considerable cost and effort and will likely find themselves in violation of the state mandated deadline for distributing absentee ballots.”
ALSO READ: Why Trump’s Arlington controversy is actually a crime
Kennedy, a former environmental lawyer and noted conspiracy theorist, ran for president as an independent this year, partly with the financial backing of GOP megadonors who may have hoped he would divert votes away from Democrats.
However, last month, amid a mountain of bizarre scandals involving dead animals and polling mired in the single digits, he dropped out of the race and threw his support behind Trump — vowing that he would take himself off the ballot in any state where he could potentially be a spoiler.
That has not worked out well for Kennedy so far, though, because in many states, the deadline for ballots to be finalized has passed. A similar motion he filed to take himself off the ballot in Michigan was also rejected, with a local judge there saying officials are not bound by the last-minute "whims" of candidates.
