Charges that had been filed against Jeremy Kauffman, chairman of the embattled Libertarian Party of New Hampshire, over an alleged racist incident in a Market Basket parking lot earlier this year have been dropped.
Kauffman, 41, told the Globe that prosecutors had abandoned the charges of disorderly conduct and obstructing government administration without producing any discovery in the case.
The prosecutor, Manchester City Solicitor Emily Gray Rice, confirmed that the charges were dropped, but declined to comment further.
The disorderly conduct charge had alleged Kauffman yelled “racist terms and profanities” during a confrontation with several people in the grocery store parking lot in Manchester, N.H., on April 4, according to court records. The obstruction charge had alleged he refused to identify himself to police.
His trial had been scheduled to take place last week, but both charges were dropped June 30.
Kauffman, a Manchester resident who often engages in inflammatory rhetoric online, said on social media he had told “a likely mentally-ill African man” who was “behaving erratically” to leave both the parking lot and the state. He said the incident shows how the government treats “dangerous African men as saints” and how police “prevent decent men from maintaining order.”
In the past, Kauffman has called for “less democracy” and encouraged those who share his views to make New Hampshire inhospitable to those who don’t.
“We are the moral ones,” he wrote on X, “and those who disagree must either change, conform, or leave.”
While his misdemeanor court case is over, Kauffman is still playing defense in another venue, after the Libertarian National Committee decided to sever ties with the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire over the state affiliate’s endorsement of Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential race.
Kauffman has appealed to the national party’s judicial committee, asking that the disaffiliation be reversed. National party leaders have filed their response, and several stakeholders have weighed in individually as well.
Those supporting the disaffiliation include current and former members of the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire.
Justin O’Donnell, who had managed Kauffman’s 2022 campaign for US Senate, filed a brief blaming Kauffman for a 2024 social media post that had endorsed the idea of assassinating Vice President Kamala Harris. O’Donnell wrote that the post prompted the then-chairman to resign in disgust, paving the way for Kauffman’s rise.
“Kauffman did not inherit a broken affiliate that he tried to rescue,” O’Donnell wrote. “He actively broke the affiliate, drove out its democratically elected Chair with threat-level public behavior, and then stepped directly into the leadership vacuum his own misconduct created.”
Kauffman has openly criticized the Libertarian Party as ineffective, even calling some members “loser apes” during their convention in May. He has campaigned on dismantling the Libertarian Party and described the Republican Party as a better vehicle to achieve libertarian objectives.
Kauffman’s appeal was submitted on July 2. Per party bylaws, the judicial committee must schedule a hearing within 20 to 40 days of that date.
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Steven Porter can be reached at steven.porter@globe.com. Follow him @reporterporter.