Updated:: Presidential Candidates qualified for Rhode Island March 4th Primary

A recent memo from the Secretary of State’s office lists which candidates are qualified to be on Rhode Island ballots thus far for the March 4th primary.

For Democrats this list includes Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barack Obama, Dennis Kucinich and Barack Obama.

Qualified Republicans are Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, John McCain, Ron Paul, Fred Thompson, Duncan Hunter, Alan Keyes, and Hugh Cort.

According to a press release, getting on the ballot is a two-step process. First, the candidates had until Dec. 26 to submit signatures to municipal elections officials for initial validation where they compare names on the nomination papers to their own voter files. Once this is done, the cities and towns have until today to submit names to the Secretary of State’s office where it is certified and checked one last time.   The next milestone in the state’s presidential primary calendar is Feb. 1, when Secretary of State, Ralph Mollis, will hold a public lottery at the State House to determine the order in which the candidates will appear on the Democratic and Republican ballots.

Bill Richardson did not receive enough valid signatures, but it doesn’t matter since he dropped out of the race.  Tom Tancredo, Chris Dodd, and Joe Biden withdrew their names from the ballot.

There were 7 candidates with more than 2,000 signatures as compared to 1 in 2004 (George W. Bush). Ron Paul had the most signatures with 3,109 certified signatures, and Hillary was second with 2,902 certified signatures.