North Carolina

An individual seeking to become a write-in candidate for President must file with the SBE:

1) a “declaration of intent”, and

2) a petition containing the signatures of 500 qualified voters of the State

by noon on the 90th day before the general election – Monday, August 4, 2008.

Verification by the chairman of the county board of elections shall be completed within two weeks from the date the petitions are presented.

* Before collecting of signatures begins, the candidate needs to file a “Petition Request Form” with the NC State Board of Elections.

PETITIONS:

-- The candidate will need to download and print out the “Write-in Petition” form to use for collecting petitions.

-- Each form contains blanks for 20 signatures.

-- The signers must be registered voters in North Carolina.

-- Write-in candidates need to collect 500 signatures. Everything is due by August 4th.

-- The petition forms are to be segregated by county. All signers on a particular petition form need to be residents of the county named on that form. When all the signatures are collected, the candidate or a representative will need to submit them to the appropriate county's board(s) of elections. These county boards of elections will verify the signatures on the forms within two weeks time, and then the petitions can be collected back from them. Then, all the verified petitions will need to be delivered to the state board of elections. Along with the candidate’s "Declaration of Intent", the 500 verified signatures on these petitions will complete the candidate’s application for write-in candidacy.

The state board of elections said that it is possible to mail in the petitions to the boards of elections, and have them mailed back, but most often they are brought in in person.

* * * *

Instructions for the "Petition For Write-In Candidate In Partisan Elections" form:

1) There are three blanks at the top of each petition form which must be filled out. The first is to identify which county the signatures are being collected in. The second should say the candidate’s name. The third should say, "President of the United States".

2) The rest of the form is devoted to the petition signers, and is self-explanatory. It asks for each signer's name, residence address, city, town & zipcode, birth date, and signature.

The signers must be registered voters in the appropriate county.