CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. (CN) — Fourteen Long Island Democrats filed a federal class action complaint late Monday claiming their mysteriously rejiggered party affiliations puts them in jeopardy of being disenfranchised in today's primary.
New York has a closed primary system, so voters can cast ballots only in the party in which they are registered.
That's not fair, lead plaintiff Leonard Joseph Campanello says, calling it a "widespread and ongoing" pattern of removing eligible voters from the state's voter rolls.
In their lawsuit against the State Board of Elections, Campanello and other plaintiffs say their registration was changed to other-than-Democratic without their consent.
Campanello says his registration was switched to Republican through "an identical, pixel-by-pixel copy of the electronic signature appearing on his driver's license in 2007, which had been electronically transferred to the 'change of party affiliation form.'"
The federal lawsuit came the night before New Yorkers take to the polls, with 247 delegates at stake in the Democratic primary and 95 in the Republican one.
It's likely to be a first no matter which Democrat prevails at the national convention: the first woman presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, or the first Jewish one, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders; and, if Trump takes the Republican race, the first reality TV star.
All three — along with a host of celebrity supporters and political heavyweights, including former President Bill Clinton and the Clintons' daughter Chelsea — have criss-crossed the Empire State, New York City and especially Brooklyn in the past few days to stump for votes in a state's closed primary system.
Independent-minded New Yorkers, however, say in their lawsuit that they should be free to choose whomever they want despite their party affiliation, and that state law disenfranchises independents.
As a result, the plaintiffs "are likely to be deprived of the right to vote, as have the thousands of similarly situated voters who complained to the Board of Elections regarding the improper voter registration switches and purges," the lawsuit states.
"Tens of thousands of New Yorkers face the threat of disenfranchisement in the 2016 Presidential Preference Primary ... and will continue to be shut out of the democratic process until defendants reform their registration practices.
"In Brooklyn alone, 63,558 Democrats have been inexplicably purged from voter rolls," according to the complaint.
Plaintiffs and "thousands of other voters" seek redress in "anticipation of the tumult that will assuredly engulf" the nominating process. They call New York State's laws among the most "opaque and oppressive voter laws" in the nation.
They ask the court to jump in, as that they have appealed to the Board of Election "without result."
"Nothing can protect their right to vote save an order from this court."
They also say a federal judge's order "will serve to foster a belief in democracy."
Plaintiffs say they had already put the election board on notice that it planned to sue, but never heard back.
In addition to Campanello's complaint of de facto electronic forgery, other plaintiffs say their Democratic party affiliation was switched to independent, or not registered at all, or purged, or not changed from a different party to Democrat.
Justice USA, which describes itself as a "national organization advancing election integrity, transparency and the protection of voting rights for all Americans," says it's turned in 200 unsworn affidavits of voters who can't pull the lever Tuesday.
