Phil Lyman asks US Supreme Court to declare Gov. Cox ineligible for reelection
Oct 22, 2024, 7:00 PM
Phil Lyman at a rally at the state Capitol in Salt Lake City Thursday. The write-in gubernatorial candidate on Tuesday announced he is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to disqualify Gov. Spencer Cox from the general election ballot. (Bridger Beal-Cvetko, KSL.com)
(Bridger Beal-Cvetko, KSL.com)
SALT LAKE CITY — Phil Lyman announced Tuesday he is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to disqualify Gov. Spencer Cox’s bid for reelection, appealing an earlier decision from Utah’s high court that shot down his attempts to install himself as the Republican nominee for governor.
Lyman has filed a series of legal motions seeking to invalidate Cox as the GOP gubernatorial nominee since losing to the incumbent governor in the June primary. In August, he asked Utah’s Supreme Court to throw Cox out of office and off of the general election ballot, arguing that he is the rightful nominee because he earned more than 60% of the vote during the party’s nominating convention in April. The court dismissed Lyman’s filing on Aug. 14, but Lyman told KSL at the time he planned to appeal.
His announcement Tuesday morning comes just 14 days before Election Day.
“We have decided to appeal this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court because we believe the Utah Supreme Court’s dismissal was frivolous and misconstrued the previous SCOTUS ruling on New York State Board of Elections v. Lopez Torres,” Lyman said in a statement. “There is enough history of litigation surrounding SB54 to support an appeal to SCOTUS. We look forward to the next steps in this process.”
Lyman was referring to a 2014 law that allows candidates to qualify for the primary ballot by collecting signatures or by winning the delegate vote during the convention. He has argued that he is the rightful Republican Party nominee because party bylaws state that any candidate who receives at least 60% of the delegate vote is the party’s nominee.
Read the full story from KSL.com here.
