The state Election Office has removed nine candidates for state offices from the official Nov. 7 ballot, although their names do appear in the Utah Voter Information Pamphlet.
The candidates have been removed because they failed to meet the Sept. 15 deadline for filing campaign finance reports.
They are: Natural Law Party gubernatorial candidate Dub Richards; Libertarian Kerk Phillips, state Senate District 14; Kelly Chopus, Democrat, House District 28; state school board candidate Bruce Parry; and five Independent American candidates for the state House — Cheryl Tullius (District 32), Stephen Duke Miller (District 59), Cris Atkin (District 64), Alan Jenkins (District 66) and Matt Hopkins (District 67).
Catherine Jensen, an Independent American candidate in House District 65, also missed the deadline and was initially included in the list of disqualified candidates. But the Election Office later discovered Jensen had previously withdrawn from the race.
Victor Schafer, an Independent American candidate in House District 72, remains on the ballot. He, too, was originally identified as a candidate who missed the deadline, but his report — postmarked before the deadline — simply arrived late.
Hopkins and Tullius were not originally listed by the Election Office as having missed the deadline, but further review of the reports revealed they had.
The Utah Democratic Party had hoped Chopus could upset Rep. Afton Bradshaw, the Republican incumbent in District 28, which includes the extreme southeastern part of Salt Lake City. The district generally votes about 52 percent Democratic except in Bradshaw's races, according to Utah Democratic Party chairman Todd Taylor.
"I just have so much going on in my personal life that it was a lower priority," Chopus, a stay-at-home mom who works as a freelance fund-raiser, said of the filing deadline.
She said she hopes to run for the office again in two years.
This is only the second time the early Sept. 15 deadline has been in place for state-office candidates. But state elections officer Amy Naccarato said she was "shocked" so many candidates missed the deadline since only a couple missed it two years ago and because her office worked closely with the political parties to be sure they were informed.
The next filing deadline is Oct. 31. Candidates who miss it will be removed from the ballot.
Contributing: Bob Bernick Jr.
E-MAIL: zman@desnews.com