It's unclear which law enforcement agency would handle a potential investigation into Republican gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin's campaign after the state Board of Elections invalidated thousands of duplicated petition signatures last month.

State Democratic Party leaders Tuesday demanded answers from Zeldin's campaign about who is responsible for the extra petitions and for a criminal probe after the Times Union first reported this week the 11,000 invalidated and duplicate petitions were assembled and bound at the state Republican Party headquarters in Albany.

"This is election fraud," New York State Democratic Committee Chair Jay Jacobs said. "If someone is seeking to become the governor, the chief law enforcement officer for the state of New York, at a basic minimum, they ought to be willing to demonstrate that they're going to comply with the law."

Zeldin was removed as an Independence Party candidate after the state Board of Elections invalidated 11,000 photocopied petition signatures submitted on the last day of the May filing deadline, falling short of the required 45,000 signatures.

"Our campaign had no knowledge of any photocopies and didn't make any photocopies," Katie Vincentz, spokeswoman for Zeldin's campaign, said in a statement Tuesday. "Hochul is desperate for any distraction she can possibly muster to get heat off her pathetic support for cashless bail, Alvin Bragg, congestion pricing and other terrible laws, policies and politicians. The wild irony here is that Kathy Hochul has earned quite an infamous reputation in New York as the undisputed queen of scandal, abuse and pay-to-play corruption."​

Top state Democrats continue to call for Albany County District Attorney David Soares' office to commence a criminal investigation into the photocopied, duplicated signatures filed to get Zeldin's name on a third-party line for the November general election. 

Senate Elections Committee chair Zellnor Myrie emailed a letter to the Albany County DA's office requesting the probe earlier this month. 

The DA's office continues to review the letter and and potential for a criminal probe together with the state Board of Elections (BOE).

The office has not requested, nor received the signatures or other related information from the BOE as of Tuesday.

"We're engaged with the Board of Elections in that review [and] whatever happens will be, at least, partially a function of what their conclusions are," said Darrell Camp, Albany County DA spokesman.

Democratic leaders said Tuesday they have not sent letters or requested state Attorney General Letitia James' office investigate the matter. 

Jacobs stressed the Albany DA is the appropriate agency for the job.

"Anytime there is a question of petition fraud, which is what this is about, that's generally handled by a district attorney, and I think that's the best place for this to be handled," Jacobs said.

A spokesman with the state Democrats added the petitions in question were submitted and binded in Albany County, according to the Times Union report, so the county DA's office is the most appropriate agency.

A geographic or other conflict of interest would force the DA's office to recuse itself from further review.

A state agency must refer the matter to the attorney general's office for the AG to open a separate investigation.

The state Board of Elections did not return multiple requests for comment about the review or intent to refer the incident to the AG's office.

“Given that the petitions were submitted and bound in Albany County, the district attorney’s office is the appropriate law enforcement entity for the complaint,” said Jerrel Harvey, communications director with the Hochul campaign. 

The attorney general's office declined to comment Tuesday.

The state Board of Elections and the governor's office did not return multiple requests for comment.​

"The right to vote is sacred," said Assembly Elections Committee Chair Latrice Walker, a Brooklyn Democrat. "It should be protected and respected at all costs."

​Zeldin's campaign went on to press Attorney General Letitia James' office to investigate Gov. Kathy Hochul's office for awarding a multi-million-dollar contract to top campaign donors without following the state’s competitive bidding process, and awarding a multi-billion dollar contract to a person who recently hosted an in-person fundraiser for the governor.

New York State Republican Party spokeswoman Jessica Proud stressed the duplicates were an inadvertent mistake amid last-minute chaos before the filing deadline, as hundreds of volunteers from across the state collected signatures and dropped them off at various locations.

"There is no greater perpetrator of corruption than New York's Democrat Party, who tried to steal the election with their illegal schemes to gerrymander and stuff the voter roles with foreign citizens," Proud said Tuesday. "The highest court in New York — filled with Democrat-appointed judges —​ slapped them down. They continue to prove that they are just trying to distract from the very real pay-to-play corruption going on inside Kathy Hochul's administration." 

More than 20 volunteers, interns and staff frantically put together hundreds of pages of signatures to file with the Board of Elections, Proud said earlier this week, adding it's common for the party to make copies of campaign petitions.