Last year a Montana Democratic Party spokesperson told the media “The Montana Democratic Party welcomes all voices to participate in the Democratic process -- unlike the Montana GOP, which... has a record of trying to remove third-party candidates from the ballot.”

So when the Montana Green Party turned in enough signatures to qualify for the ballot this year, what do you think the Democrats did?

(Helena, Mt) On Monday the Montana Green Party (MGP), and 8 of its supporters, filed suit in Federal District Court. The case, which names the Montana Secretary of State, Corey Stapleton, as the defendant, asks the court to grant an immediate and permanent injunction on the enforcement of MCA, § 13-10-601(2)(a), (b), (c), and (d), as these statutes impose an unconstitutional burden on the MGP and its supporters by violating the first and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution.

The initial complaint declares that "the Plaintiffs will be denied their rights to actively engage in the exercise of their free speech, right to political association, right to form a political party, seek redress of grievances, cast an effective vote, and equal protection and due process of the laws of the State of Montana and the United States of America."

The Green Party of the United States strongly disagrees with the decision by Judge James P. Reynolds to remove the Montana Green Party from the November ballot. In his decision, Judge Reynolds sided with the Montana Democratic Party which had filed an emergency injunction in April, challenging some of the petition signatures.

Montana Green Party spokesperson Danielle Breck stated "He (Judge Reynolds) managed to throw out exactly enough (signatures) to get us off the ballot".

Greetings Green folks,

Bad news from the court today.  The Judge granted the Democrats their emergency injunction to remove us from the ballot.  From here we have to either live with this decision or appeal; however our lawyer does not feel like he can afford to continue the process pro bono.  So, we need to determine what is our best way to move forward.

Thanks,
Dani Breck

Sen. Jon Tester of Montana was already facing a tough re-election battle in a state that Donald Trump won by a landslide — and then the Green Party made the Democrat’s job that much tougher by qualifying for the ballot.

Now the Montana Democratic Party is scrambling to oust the Greens. It has asked a judge to decertify the left-wing party by declaring 180 petition signatures invalid for reasons such as bad handwriting, use of initials instead of full names and failure to write in cursive.

In 2017, Cheri Honkala was the Green Party’s candidate for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in Philadelphia’s District 197. Ann Garrison spoke to her about what happened.

Ann Garrison: Cheri, tell us about the state office race that you were told you had lost.

Cheri Honkala: it was a special election last year for a representative to the Pennsylvania State House. On the night of the election there were literally hundreds of calls to our campaign headquarters and the district attorney's office about election fraud. And I'm sorry to report that the same political machine that was responsible is alive and well today.

The court case brought by Democrats challenging the Green Party’s access to the 2018 election ballot in Montana will resume this Thursday under review of a new judge.

Democrats allege Montana’s Republican Secretary of State erred in certifying the Green Party for the ballot.

(HELENA, MT) –  On Tuesday, Missoula's Quinten M. Rhoads will be in District Court in Helena, at 1:30pm, to represent the Montana Green Party (MTGP) and those who signed petitions to place the MTGP on the 2018 election ballot. Rhoads will face the international law firm of Perkins & Coie representing the Montana Democratic Party (MDP) with Peter Meloy of Helena. MTGP coordinator Dani Breck stated, "I did an internet search on the out-of-state firm, Perkins & Coie; for the Montana Dems to bring in this behemoth that has represented the DNC & HRC in attempt to silence Montanans' voices does not seem very 'democratic' or 'American' for that matter."

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Green Party leaders said today that Democrats and their supporters in the media have launched a Russia-baiting campaign to smear Dr. Jill Stein and the Green Party with baseless accusations and insinuations that the latter colluded with Russia during the 2016 election.

Greens said that the request from the Republican-dominated Senate Select Committee on Intelligence for documents from Dr. Stein is not proof of collusion or anything else and called such assumptions ("She was questioned by the Senate committee, therefore she must be guilty") an exercise in McCarthyism and political intimidation.

U.S. Representative Bob Brady, who has been the head of Philadelphia's Democratic Party for three decades, has been besieged this summer with allegations that he bribed a political opponent in 2012 to drop a would-be primary challenge against him.

But a swirl of corruption accusations around Brady is nothing new. In fact, an ongoing federal lawsuit pits Brady's party apparatus against plaintiffs asserting that there was election fraud in a special election to fill a seat in Pennsylvania's House of Representatives.