Qualified New York political parties

In New York State, to obtain automatic ballot access, a party must qualify every two years by receiving the greater of 130,000 votes or 2% of the vote in the previous gubernatorial election or presidential election.^[1] As of 2025, the following New York political parties are qualified political parties with automatic ballot access: Democratic, Republican, Working Families, and Conservative.^[2]

Parties that do not qualify for automatic ballot access can petition their way onto the ballot. For statewide candidates, this requires 45,000 signatures, and requires 500 signatures in at least half of the congressional districts in the state.^[3]

Two additional parties qualified in the 2014 elections: the Women's Equality Party (a front for incumbent governor Andrew Cuomo) and the Stop Common Core Party (a line created by Republican candidate Rob Astorino). The Stop Common Core Party rechristened itself the Reform Party, initially unrelated to the national Reform Party, on February 17, 2015. In an effort to quash a trademark infringement dispute from the national Reform Party, the state party allowed national Reform Party officers, including chairman Bill Merrill, to take over the party. In September 2016, Curtis Sliwa orchestrated a hostile takeover of the Reform Party, and it is no longer related to the national party.

For the first time in the 48-year history of the Libertarian Party of New York, the party qualified for automatic ballot access with Larry Sharpe's 90,816 votes. In addition, former Syracuse mayor Stephanie Miner achieved automatic ballot access for the newly created Serve America Movement line. The Women's Equality Party and the Reform Party failed to re-qualify. Shortly after the Libertarian Party and Serve America Movement qualified for ballot access, the New York State Board of Elections raised the threshold for automatic ballot access from 50,000 votes to 2% or about 130,000 votes. As a result, both parties had their automatic ballot access rescinded.

The 2020 presidential race was the first presidential race to count for automatic ballot access in addition to the gubernatorial race. It was also the first election under the new qualification threshold where candidates were required to receive the greater of 130,000 votes or 2% of the vote to maintain automatic ballot access. The Libertarian Party of New York, the Green Party of New York, and the Independence Party of New York did not receive enough votes to re-qualify.^[5] The Serve America Movement was unable to re-qualify since it did not run a candidate.^[6]

The 2022 gubernatorial election was the first New York gubernatorial election in over 80 years not featuring any third-party candidates after the New York State Board of Elections rejected the petitions of all the minor parties that put forward candidates.^[8]