A Hartford Superior Court judge has effectively cancelled the Democratic primary for a state House seat from Enfield (House District 58) by ruling the forms carrying the petitioning candidate’s voter signatures are invalid.
State Rep. John Santanella is the party-endorsed candidate. He sued, claiming his opponent, Tom Tyler, was issued petition forms prematurely. Santarella also said those forms were turned in late and incomplete.
Enfield’s Democratic registrar, Beth Jerez, says the forms went out early because she was given the incorrect issue date by the Secretary of the State’s office. She also says that office gave her an incorrect version of the petition form. Still, she certified Tyler’s nearly 300 valid signatures.
Judge Stuart Rosen ruled on Tuesday for Santanella, throwing out those signatures:
The court hereby declares that: (1) the petition forms made available to the circulators prior to May 26, 2026, are invalid pursuant to General Statutes §§ 9-409 (b), 9-410, and 9-412; (2) all of the petition forms filed in support of Tyler's qualifications as a candidate in the primary are invalid under §§ 9-410 (c) and 9- 412; and (3) Tyler failed to satisfy the statutory requirements to be qualified to run in the primary because he did not obtain and file the necessary number of signatures by the June 9, 2026, 4:00 p.m. deadline.
Petitioning candidate Tyler wrote on Facebook:
Late yesterday afternoon a Hartford Superior Court judge threw out all of our signatures to get on a primary ballot to face John Santanella. The judge, with his undemocratic move, relied on the fact that the Secretary of the State provided an incorrect version of the petition form to the Enfield Democrat Registrar of Voter. Neither Beth Jerez, the Enfield Democratic Registrar, nor Sheila Bailey, the Enfield Town Clerk, had anything whatsoever to do with creating, producing or disseminating this incorrect form. Both simply performed their duties as messengers in passing on the version of this form distributed to them from the Secretary of the State, and neither of them knew or should have known that the Secretary of the State provided an incorrect version of this petition form. In fact, Beth Jerez was simply following instructions from the Secretary of the State as she was trained to do. The judge agreed that no fraud occurred in obtaining the signatures, and the judge had no question about the validity of the 299 signatures obtained by our campaign from Democratic registered voters within the 58th District.
Tyler says he may appeal the ruling, or run as an Independent this fall.
There’s no comment yet from the Secretary of the State. WTIC has reached out to Rep. Santanella for comment.
