Kanye West is going after the top election official in Ohio for allegedly going out of his way to keep Ye off the presidential ballot ... according to a new lawsuit.
Kanye's suing the state's Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose days after the election head rejected nearly 15,000 signatures and other paperwork submitted by Kanye's campaign, which deemed him unqualified as an independent candidate for Prez.
LaRose cited mismatched info on the documents as the reason for tossing them out, but according to Kanye's suit ... he didn't have the right to do that in the first place.
Kanye's lawyers claim it's LaRose's duty to accept any petition for an independent candidate as long as there is no protest filed and it doesn't break any Ohio laws.
The emergency filing to get Kanye on Ohio's ballot comes as his presidential bid is reeling -- he was booted off the crucial Wisconsin ballot last week, along with coming up short in Montana.
He was also removed from the ballot in his home state of Illinois -- even after dropping at least $30k to get on it -- because election officials said more than half his submitted signatures were invalid.
On the plus side, he is currently on the ballot in the states of Arkansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Utah and Vermont ... but that's not gonna get the job done. The fact is ... if Ye's campaign lasts, he'd end up being a spoiler candidate, so Ohio is important because it's a swing state.