Democrat to withdraw after Ky. GOP representative sues, saying opponent waited too long to switch parties
A Kentucky state representative is suing to have his Democratic challenger removed from the ballot this November on the grounds that his opponent is ineligible to run because, until recently, he was also a Republican.
Rep. Kevin Bratcher, R-Louisville, filed his suit in Jefferson County Circuit Court on Tuesday against Matthew Pfaadt and state and local election officials, alleging Pfaadt is “not a bona fide candidate.”
Now Pfaadt will voluntarily withdraw from the race, his attorney Anna Whites told the Herald-Leader Sunday.
“Unfortunately, and I hate this and I was not involved in his campaign earlier, but I do believe Rep. Bratcher may be correct,” Whites said.
Whites said they intend to offer a settlement in which Pfaadt withdraws, but she does not want her client to pay the attorney’s fees associated with the case.
Bratcher did not immediately return the Herald-Leader’s request for comment. The paper also reached out to Executive Director of the Kentucky Democratic Party, Sebastian Kitchen, without success.
Democrat Suzanne Kugler, who ran against Bratcher in 2020 and was originally going to run again in 2022, was no longer a resident of District 29 after redistricting and withdrew from the race. In such a case, state law allows for the candidate to be replaced on the ballot, which also happened in the 12th Senate District this year.
Pfaadt stepped in to be Kugler’s replacement in April.
But filed as an exhibit with the complaint was a copy of Pfaadt’s most recent voter registration record, which shows that he only registered as a Democrat on January 11.
That matters because state law requires that in order to be replaced on the ballot, the new nominee must have been eligible to vote in their party’s primary. In order to be eligible, Pfaadt would have needed to change his registration by Dec. 31, 2021.
A Herald-Leader search of Pfaadt’s voter registration in Lexis Nexis, a search engine which draws from public records, shows Pfaadt registered as a Republican in 2007.
Whites said Democrats may still be able to field a candidate in District 29 if they can find someone by the end of the week.
“It’s always nice to have the name on the ballot,” she said. “I believe the timing of the suit, for a problem that must have been obvious immediately, was to try and have a blank on the ballot with no Democratic name, because this is something that would have been obvious to anyone checking the filing.”
Bratcher’s attorney Robert Nemes was unavailable for comment, but Jason Nemes, a state representative from Louisville and fellow attorney at Commonwealth Counsel Group, disagreed with Whites’ assessment.
“It’s too late,” he said. “They can read the statute for themselves, but they’re not allowed, legally, to replace Pfaadt. I’m not going to give them a roadmap. There’s no allowance to do that.”
Kentucky Democrats have slammed the new redistricting maps drawn up by a supermajority of Republican lawmakers in both chambers of the state legislature.
A motion hour is scheduled for the case Monday morning.
This story may be updated.
This story was originally published September 11, 2022 at 1:33 PM.
