The short version
Kentucky nominates through party primaries in May. You get on the ballot by filing the proper candidate paperwork with the right filing officer; major-party candidates run in the primary and independents file for the general election.
- Offices you can run for
- Federal (U.S. House and Senate); statewide offices (Governor and other constitutional officers); the Kentucky Senate and House; county and municipal offices; and (nonpartisan) judicial seats.
- How to get on the ballot
- File your candidate paperwork, with any filing fee, during the filing window. Federal, state, and many district offices file with the Secretary of State; county and local offices file with the county clerk. The Secretary of State's online filing system provides the forms for state-filed races and samples for locally-filed ones. Campaign-finance questions go to the Registry of Election Finance.
- Who runs candidate filing
- Kentucky Secretary of State / State Board of Elections
This is a plain-language overview, not legal advice. Filing deadlines and fees change every election cycle and vary by office — the official Kentucky resources below are the final word. When in doubt, the elections authority is right and we're wrong.
Official Kentucky candidate resources
Start here for the exact deadlines, fees, forms, and signature counts for your office and cycle.
- Candidate Qualifications, Filing Officer & Fees →
- Candidate Filings (Secretary of State) →
- Candidate Filing (State Board of Elections) →
Once you're on the ballot, Motion51 runs your field game.
Get your district's voter file loaded, cut into walkable turf, and onto an app your volunteers use at the door. Kentucky is fully available — see how to get your voter file.
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Tell us what you're running for and we'll help you go from "qualified" to "knocking doors" — voter file loaded, turf cut, volunteers set up.