Legal Marijuana Now Party enlists right-wing lawyer in major party case

A Minnesota legal pot party, which is in a court fight with Democrats to save its major party status, has commissioned a local lawyer with ties to the state Republican Party — who also tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Minneapolis attorney Erick Kaardal filed a brief on behalf of the Legal Marijuana Now Party on Wednesday, urging the state Supreme Court to reject the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party’s motion to revoke its major party status. Kaardal wrote in his brief that the DFL’s allegations — that the pot party hasn’t met the state’s major party election law requirements —  are untrue. Kaardal also recorded the case number incorrectly in his filing. 

Kaardal has represented the Minnesota Republican Party pro bono, where he was also a secretary/treasurer, according to his law firm’s website. He was also an advisory board member of Minnesota’s chapter of the Federalist Society, a right-wing network that aims to create a conservative judiciary in the U.S.

Kaardal in 2020 sued former Vice President Mike Pence and Congress, seeking to stop the Electoral College count. A D.C. judge said Kaardal’s lawsuit was brimming with “baseless fraud allegations and tenuous legal claims,” and the judge filed an ethics complaint against him.

Legal Marijuana Now Party Chairperson Dennis Schuller told the Reformer that the party choose Kaardal as its attorney because of his constitutional law knowledge. Schuller said Kaardal’s political affiliation wasn’t considered prior to his hiring. 

“Political affiliation was never criteria when we were looking for people. We had limited options and that just wasn’t something we concern ourselves with,” Schuller said.

Legal Marijuana Now has started a GoFundMe to pay for its legal costs, with a goal of raising $15,000.

Democrats have an interest in seeing the Legal Marijuana Now Party — one of two parties established to legalize what is now legal — lose its major party status. Republicans have at times seemed to collude with pot party candidates in an effort to siphon votes away from Democratic candidates in close congressional and legislative races, enraging some Democrats.

Major party status confers significant advantages, especially ballot access, negating the need for the expensive and onerous process of collecting signatures to appear on the ballot.

The DFL Party in its petition to the Minnesota Supreme Court alleged that the Legal Marijuana Now Party has illustrated disregard for the state’s election law, in part because one of its candidates for the presidential primary did not consent to being on the ballot.

The DFL in its brief said Secretary of State Steve Simon made an error in certifying Legal Marijuana Now as a major party, and it is asking the Supreme Court to order Simon to bar the Legal Marijuana Now from nominating a presidential candidate. 

On Wednesday, Attorney General Keith Ellison on behalf of Simon submitted a brief saying that Simon did not make a mistake in certifying the pot party.

Ellison in the brief said that state law doesn’t authorize Simon to investigate the factual accuracy of a party’s petition for major party status. Ellison also noted the law doesn’t allow Simon to revoke a political party’s major party status based on the DFL’s allegations

Simon declined to take a position on the central merits of the DFL’s petition, according to the filing.