Legal Marijuana NOW candidate says he never planned to leave Senate race

LINCOLN — Legal Marijuana NOW U.S. Senate candidate Mike Marvin told the Examiner that he never planned to leave the race. 

Marvin said that, as of “right now,” he doesn’t plan to hold any campaign events before the November election. Marvin is currently running alongside nonpartisan U.S. Senate candidate Dan Osborn and incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. Pete Ricketts.

Legal Marijuana NOW Party officials said they have never had an interaction with their Senate nominee. While the national and local media has focused on former Democratic nominee Cindy Burbank and her efforts to get on and off the ballot, Legal Marijuana NOW, which officially became a party in 2021, has also been part of the twists and turns of this year’s Nebraska Senate race, as well as the 2024 race between Osborn and Republican U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer.

“He never contacted any of the members of our executive committee. As chairman of the party, I have never met or talked to him,” Legal Marijuana NOW Party Chair Ed Williams said. 

Williams said he was vice chair of the party since its inception. Asked by the Examiner whether the party planned to replace Marvin if he dropped out, Williams said that, to the best of his knowledge, no one wanted to replace him. 

Marvin was one of the candidates accused of being a “plant” for Osborn. On his website, Marvin said he would “work with other candidates to make sure” to have a “united front against Pete Ricketts.” 

Former Democratic nominee Burbank paid Marvin’s $1,740 candidate filing fee earlier this year. She dropped out of the race one day after the secretary of state verified Osborn’s signatures to be on the fall ballot.  

Marvin has denied being a plant for Osborn. 

The Senate race between Osborn and Pete Ricketts will differ from Osborn’s bid in 2024 against Fischer because that was a true “head-to-head” race. Legal Marijuana NOW party leaders at the time chose not to run a candidate because supporters of Osborn and Kerry Eddy, the former 2024 nominee who stepped aside for Osborn, threatened to sue. 

Nebraska Democrats decided not to go forward with a write-in candidate in 2024 after Osborn flirted with seeking Democratic and third-party support until it was too late for the Democrats to run a candidate of their own, which led to some hurt feelings among some of his potential supporters on the left. 

Osborn’s campaign had no comment on how Marvin’s staying on the ballot would affect the race. 

‘Unlikely to be enough to make a difference’

Dona-Gene Barton, a political science professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who studies political behavior, said she thinks Legal Marijuana NOW’s presence in the race is “unlikely to be enough to make a difference in the final election result, as has been the case in past statewide elections.” 

While Ricketts and Osborn are considered the leading candidates, there will likely be two new political parties as efforts by two groups met the petition signature threshold, though it’s unclear which races will get candidates from the new parties. There is also a lawsuit trying to force state Democrats to find a replacement for Burbank. 

Rick Beard, Legal Marijuana NOW’s gubernatorial candidate, said party members don’t know Marvin as “he doesn’t contact us, he won’t do a town hall with LMN candidates, we don’t endorse him, and he doesn’t endorse me, as he supports Lynne Walz.” 

Beard also pointed out that Omaha Tribe Attorney General John Cartier is the treasurer for Marvin, the sponsor of the new “America First Party” and “Osborn’s lawyer.” 

“Figure that out,” Beard said. 

Cartier wrote a letter to Legal Marijuana NOW leaders in 2024, arguing that the party had flubbed its handling of a convention that year to weigh replacing Eddy. Cartier, currently registered nonpartisan, is listed as treasurer for the Marvin campaign, according to the Federal Election Commission. Cartier also received $500 from Osborn’s campaign for legal fees in November 2024, according to the FEC. 

A comment on an Examiner Facebook post about Marvin staying in the Senate race, which appears to have been written by Marion Beard, Rick’s wife and the vice chair of the party, reads, “No one in the legal marijuana NOW party knows Mike Marvin. He has never contacted us and we do NOT endorse him.” 

The general election is Nov 3.