NOTICE OF TORT CLAIM

TO:
Marion County Election Board
200 E. Washington Street, W-144
Indianapolis, IN 46204

AND TO:
Attorney General of Indiana
Indiana Government Center South, 5th Floor
302 W. Washington Street
Indianapolis, IN 46204

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1. CLAIMANT INFORMATION

• Full Legal Name: Robbin Stewart
• Current Mailing Address: P.O. Box 29164, Indianapolis, IN 46229
• Email Address: gtbear@gmail.com
• Voter Registration Status: Registered to vote in Marion County, Indiana.
• Candidate Status: Active candidate for the Office of Marion County Clerk.

2. DATE, TIME, AND PLACE OF THE INCIDENT

• Date of Incident: Election Day, Tuesday, May 5, 2026
• Time of Incident: Circa 2:00 PM
• Location: RecycleForce, 700 N. Sherman Drive, Indianapolis, IN

3. STATEMENT OF FACTS CAUSING THE CLAIM

On Election Day at approximately 2:00 PM, Claimant Robbin Stewart—a duly registered voter in Marion County and an active candidate running for the public office of Marion County Clerk—attended the polling location at RecycleForce to vote. Upon presenting to vote, precinct officials Jane Doe and John Doe informed Claimant: "No ID, no vote."

Claimant directly asked the officials: "So I can't vote? Should I leave?"

The precinct officials failed to provide Claimant with the legally mandated option to cast a provisional ballot, allowing Claimant to leave the premises without voting. This specific exchange made the denial final. The tort was complete at that exact moment. Any events, options, or actions that occurred after this final interaction do not change, cure, or affect the finality of this constitutional injury.

The political status of the Claimant as an active candidate for County Clerk significantly elevates the impact of this injury. The County Clerk serves as the mandatory Secretary of the Election Board itself. By blocking a candidate for that specific administrative office from casting a ballot, the Board's agents directly disrupted a candidate's own political franchise, campaign participation, and ballot access monitoring.

This final denial is part of a decades-long, county-wide custom and practice by the Marion County Election Board. This unwritten custom has been continuously fought and documented by Claimant in federal and state courts, including Claimant's 2008 voter ID litigation against Clerk Beth White (Robbin Stewart v. Marion County, et al., No. 1:08-CV-586) and the Stewart v. Proffitt litigation.

The persistence of this identical "no ID, no vote" violation—which Claimant also personally experienced at this exact RecycleForce site two years ago, across the street in 2016, and during empirical testing revealing a 50% failure rate across five separate 2026 early voting centers—proves a systemic, deliberate failure to train precinct workers on mandatory federal HAVA safeguards from 2008 to the present day.

4. LEGAL BASIS AND CONSTITUTIONAL VIOLATIONS

The acts and omissions of the precinct officials acting under the authority of the Marion County Election Board constitute an instantaneous deprivation of rights under color of law, specifically:

1. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, destroying the guarantee of a free and equal election.
2. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 2, Section 2, by directly infringing upon and denying Claimant's absolute, constitutional right to vote as a registered citizen meeting all voter qualifications.
3. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 1, Section 1, by subverting the core purpose of a free government instituted for the citizen's well-being and exercise of inherent rights.
4. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 1, Section 9, by placing an unconstitutional material burden on Claimant's core political expression and inquiry at the polling place.
5. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 1, Section 12, by denying Claimant a remedy by due course of law and failing to administer election procedures completely and without denial.
6. Violation of the Indiana Constitution, Article 1, Section 31, by directly obstructing the right of the citizen to assemble in a peaceable manner, to consult for their common good, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances, specifically targeting a candidate's right to petition the electorate via the ballot.
7. Violation of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) regarding the mandatory availability of provisional ballots.
8. Deprivation of Civil Rights Civilly Actionable via 42 U.S.C. § 1983, applying the doctrine of injuria sine damno as established in Ashby v. White (1703).

5. IDENTITY OF RESPONSIBLE GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES

Precinct election officials Jane Doe and John Doe, the precinct election supervisor on duty at RecycleForce on May 5, 2026, at approximately 2:00 PM, and the administration of the Marion County Election Board responsible for poll worker training.

6. STATEMENT OF DAMAGES AND FINANCIAL DEMAND

As a direct result of the completed unlawful denial of the right to vote and the failure to provide an immediate provisional ballot option, Claimant suffered an immediate deprivation of civil rights, emotional distress, and a permanent constitutional injury. Claimant also asserts state-layer nominal damage claims under the Indiana Constitution.

• Total Amount of Financial Demand: $17,000.00

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SIGNATURE OF CLAIMANT

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Robbin Stewart

Date: May 15, 2026

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Why Being a Candidate Changes Your Pitch to Lawyers

 Rosen v. Port of Portland, 641 F.2d 1243 (1981) – Struck down registration and ID requirements for leafleting as an unconstitutional chill.

317 308 0663 old phone number

 

erstone of this list.

this list was AI generated and might not be reliable.  The AI is now too slow so I wwill start a new session.\ 

kinda useless list has general first amendmemtn cases not the disclaimer casees only. AI is being too slow to fix it.  

The Wall of Precedent: 50 Cases

1. Lovell v. City of Griffin (1938)
2. Schneider v. State (1939)
3. Cantwell v. Connecticut (1940)
4. Jamison v. Texas (1943)
5. West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943)
6. Thomas v. Collins (1945)
7. Saia v. New York (1948)
8. Kunz v. New York (1951)
9. NAACP v. Alabama (1958)
10. Speiser v. Randall (1958)
11. Bates v. City of Little Rock (1960)
12. Talley v. California (1960)
13. Shelton v. Tucker (1960)
14. Louisiana ex rel. Gremillion v. NAACP (1961)
15. Edwards v. South Carolina (1963)
16. Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee (1963)
17. Garrity v. New Jersey (1967)
18. Keyishian v. Board of Regents (1967)
19. Tinker v. Des Moines (1969)
20. Baird v. State Bar of Arizona (1971)
21. In re Stolar (1971)
22. Healy v. James (1972)
23. Perry v. Sindermann (1972)
24. Papish v. University of Missouri (1973)
25. Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo (1974)
26. Elrod v. Burns (1976)
27. Wooley v. Maynard (1977)
28. Abood v. Detroit Board of Education (1977)
29. Lefkowitz v. Cunningham (1977)
30. First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978)
31. Stewart v. Taylor (1997)
32. Branti v. Finkel (1980)
33. Brown v. Socialist Workers '74 Campaign Committee (1982)
34. State v. Coe (1984)
35. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. v. Public Utilities Commission (1986)
36. Riley v. National Federation of the Blind of N.C. (1988)
37. Keller v. State Bar of California (1990)
38. Rutan v. Republican Party of Illinois (1990)
39. McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission (1995)
40. Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group (1995)
41. People v. White (1995)
42. State v. Burgess (1997)
43. State v. Gutweiler (1998)
44. Doe v. Mortham (1998)
45. Buckley v. American Constitutional Law Foundation (1999)
46. Boy Scouts of America v. Dale (2000)
47. State v. Moses (2000)
48. Watchtower Bible & Tract Soc. of NY v. Village of Stratton (2002)
49. Ex parte Harrison (1908)
50. State v. Junkins (1910) 

The link to the list is blogspot.com.

In your Cease and Desist, you can cite Stewart v. Taylor (Entry #31) to show that Indiana’s attempt to ban anonymous literature was struck down nearly 30 years ago. This list serves as proof that the Board's attorney-members are ignoring decades of binding and persuasive authority.

If you’d like, I can help you format this list into a final "Exhibit A" page for your mailing.

AI can make mistakes, so double-check responses

• Landmark Supreme Court Cases - Communication Arts

  Landmark Supreme Court Cases relating to Freedom of Speech and of the Press * Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47 (1919) ... * C...

  

  www.shc.edu

too slow and too lying. i simply asked for my list of 50 cases. an hour later, you are still lying about it, and getting slower and slower to the point you dont function

The "Wall of Precedent" listed on the Ballots blog comprises 50 cases highlighting First Amendment freedoms and related liberties. The compilation spans from the early 20th century to the 2000s, focusing on freedom of speech, association, and petition. The full list can be found at Ballots Blog.

 

STATEMENT OF INTEREST OF AMICUS CURIAE

Amicus Curiae is a citizen of New York and a direct beneficiary of the "hospitable climate" for free expression fostered by the New York Constitution. Amicus’s perspective is informed by a unique intersection of labor, science, and economics: from delivering the New York Times to earning an Economics Certificate from the State University of New York (1978). Amicus has witnessed the global reach of the New York "information empire" firsthand, having contributed to the IBM ecosystem both at 590 Madison Avenue and its scientific outposts in Boulder, Colorado. Amicus submits this brief to ensure that the constitutional soil which allowed commerce, art, and science to flourish in this State is nurtured, not eroded by state-mandated disclosure.

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SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

I. The New York Constitution Provides an Affirmative, Expansive Right to Speech that Exceeds the Federal Floor.
While the First Amendment serves as a restrictive "negative" right, N.Y. Const. Art. 1, § 8 is an affirmative grant of liberty: "Every citizen may freely speak, write and publish his or her sentiments on all subjects." This Court must recognize that New York’s protection is "more expansive" than the federal First Amendment (Immuno AG. v. Moor-Jankowski, 1991). As Justice Brennan famously argued, state constitutions are a "font of individual liberties" that should not be mechanically tethered to federal minimums (Brennan, 90 Harv. L. Rev. 489).

II. The "Hospitable Climate" of New York Law is the Foundation of its Economic and Scientific Empire.
New York did not become the world’s media and financial capital by accident. The State’s status as a hub for Random House, Simon & Schuster, and IBM was made possible by a predictable legal environment that rejects prior restraint and compelled speech (Brandreth v. Lance, 1839). This "hospitable climate" for the exchange of ideas was the catalyst for an empire of commerce and science that exported stability from Wall Street to the Rocky Mountains.

III. The Right to Anonymity is a Shield Against Compelled Self-Identification.
The Supreme Court has held that an author’s decision to remain anonymous is a protected aspect of free speech (McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm., 1995). In New York, this right is deeply rooted in the Zenger Trial (1735) and the defense of the press in People v. Croswell (1804). Any state mandate requiring the disclosure of "sentiment" or "moderation" policies threatens the digital anonymity that modern dissenters require—a right New York protected alone for 150 years before the federal "incorporation" in Gitlow v. New York (1925).

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ARGUMENT

A. The Legacy of the Ticker: Data as Speech
The "Empire" of New York was built on the democratization of information. The stock ticker and the IBM/Quotron terminals on Wall Street were the pinnacle of free speech—real-time truth that drove global markets. Amicus submits that the internet is merely the modern successor to the ticker. Just as the State protected the "tape" to ensure economic dominance, it must now protect the digital square from regulatory overreach that compels the disclosure of user sentiment.

B. The Institutional Duty to Nurture
In NYT Co. v. Sullivan (1964) and the Pentagon Papers Case (1971), New York’s media institutions acted as a national watchdog. This role was only possible because New York law nurtured an environment where publishers were "responsible for the abuse of that right" after publication, rather than being micro-managed beforehand. To impose new transparency mandates on platforms today is to abandon the "Responsibility Model" that made the New York Times a global standard.

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CONCLUSION

From the trial of John Peter Zenger to the scientific dominance of 590 Madison Avenue, New York’s greatness has been inseparable from its refusal to allow the State to dictate the terms of public discourse. The Court should uphold the independent authority of the New York Constitution to protect anonymous speech and ensure that the State’s hospitable climate remains a sanctuary for the next era of innovation.