INDIANAPOLIS (CN) — Both the Indiana Election Commission and the state's highest court removed egg farmer John Rust from Republican primary ballot for U.S. Senate on Tuesday for failing to meet basic voting requirements in the last two primaries.
Indiana law requires candidates to have either voted in their party’s last two primary elections or have the permission of the party chairperson of the county they live in to run.
Rust, running as a Republican, met neither requirement. He filed a lawsuit in September 2023 challenging the rule of having to vote in the last two Republican primaries.
“The statute makes it so only a small percentage of Hoosiers and those hand-selected by the party chair are eligible to run for office,” Rust said in the lawsuit.
Marion County Judge Patrick Dietrick agreed with Rust and ruled that he should be allowed on the ballot because the primary voting restriction was unconstitutional.
“It unduly burdens Hoosiers’ long-recognized right to freely associate with the political party of one’s choosing and to cast one’s vote effectively,” Dietrick wrote.
However, the Indiana Supreme Court stayed Dietrick's ruling pending its own decision, which left Rust to plead his case before the Indiana Election Commission during a long hearing held Tuesday.
Rust’s attorney Michelle Harter, from the Greenwood firm of Leske Harter LLC, told the commission that Rust should remain on the ballot. But the commission unanimously disagreed.
“If you want to run as a candidate in this state, there are rules you have to follow,” Commissioner Suzannah Wilson Overholt said.
During the hearing, the commissioners expressed deference to the Indiana Supreme Court’s pause on the lower court’s ruling, finding Rust had not complied with the requirements of the law and should be removed from the ballot.
During the commission’s Tuesday meeting, the Indiana Supreme Court issued another order on the matter, reversing Dietrick's ruling.
While the court has yet to publish its full opinion, the dual setbacks leave Rust completely off the ballot, with U.S. House Representative Jim Banks as the sole Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate seat.
Rust vowed to appeal.
“Today proved that the political insiders are continuing to rig our elections. It’s this kind of disregard for Hoosiers that inspired me to run for the U.S. Senate in the first place,” Rust said. “We will be appealing this all the way up to the United States Supreme Court if necessary. Especially considering that this hearing had a predetermined outcome.”
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