The St. Joseph County Election Board has set a special meeting for Thursday to decide whether four Democratic candidates should appear on the Nov. 3 election ballot.
The Republican-majority three-member board voted Aug. 21 to remove from the ballot Autumn Kaylor for county auditor, Dan Caruso for New Carlisle Town Council, and Christy Donlon and Marcy Kauffman for Walkerton Town Council.
County Republican party chair Jackie Horvath had filed challenges to their candidacies, saying they had not filed their formal declarations of candidacy within 72 hours of their party caucus picking them as candidates, as required by state law.
County Democratic party chair Don Westerhausen on Friday said the party did not caucus again but party chairs and vice-chairs have since met and given him power to fill the candidate vacancies, as allowed by law.
County Election Clerk Kimberly Riskovitch on Friday said her office received those certificates of candidate selection. She said state law tasks the election board with deciding whether to accept them and allow the candidates to appear on the ballot.
