Tag: Republican Party of Virginia

Virginia Republican Gubernatorial Candidates Welcome Snyder into Race

Eric Burk

Republican gubernatorial candidates Delegate Kirk Cox (R-Colonial Heights) and Senator Amanda Chase welcomed Pete Snyder into the nomination race Tuesday.

“Look forward to working with you again Pete. Welcome to the race,” Chase tweeted, posting a picture of Snyder working in her 2019 campaign office.

Cox tweeted, “I’d like to welcome Pete Snyder to the 2021 gubernatorial race. It’s my firm belief that competition is a good thing — and I look forward to a robust discussion in which Virginia Republicans can choose the proven candidate that can best unify the party and lead Virginia forward.”

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Virginia Lawsuit Reduces Threshold: Only 2,000 Signatures Needed to Get on 2021 Ballot

Eric Burk

Statewide candidates for the Democratic primary and independents for the 2021 Virginia general election now only have to get 2,000 signatures, which can be collected electronically, and they only need to get 50 from each congressional district. The change is the result of a settlement after gubernatorial candidate Delegate Lee Carter (D-Manassas) and Democratic lieutenant governor candidate Paul Goldman sued Virginia elections officials arguing that during COVID-19, asking candidates to send teams out across the state collecting in-person signatures was a recipe for problems.

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Businessman Pete Snyder Enters Race for Virginia Governor

Eric Burk

Virginia 30 Day Fund founder Pete Snyder announced Tuesday that he is running for governor. Snyder is experienced as a social media entrepreneur, investor, and political operative. He’s positioning himself as the answer to problems caused in 2020 by Governor Ralph Northam and the Democrat-led General Assembly.

“We have faced the biggest crisis that we’ve seen in over 100 years, and our leadership in Richmond has absolutely failed us,” Snyder told The Virginia Star.

Failing businesses, closed schools, criminal justice reforms, and a loss of First and Second Amendment rights are the issues the entrepreneur said are fueling his campaign in 2021.

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Virginia GOP Moves Forward with Nominating Convention Amidst Chaos and Intense Division

Eric Burk

After another stalemate between pro-primary and pro-convention factions of the Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) State Central Committee (SCC), Chairman Rich Anderson said he will move forward with plans for a convention.

“The majority of the SCC voted today for a third time to conduct an assembled in-person Republican State Convention. Our hope is to get SCC buy-in in a later meeting on proposals to transform it to an unassembled state convention, like we did last summer,” Anderson told The Virginia Star.

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Republican Party of Virginia Fails to Clarify Nomination Process

Eric Burk

The Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) State Central Committee (SCC) failed to clarify the nominating method for its 2021 candidates in a meeting Saturday.

SCC members voted again to approve a convention, making it contingent on passing an amendment allowing an unassembled convention based on Governor Ralph Northam’s COVID-19 restrictions. The convention nomination method was first passed by the SCC on December 6 by a 42-30 majority. On Saturday, the amendment got a 41-30 majority but less than the three-fourths approval required by party rules. The SCC tabled the issue until a future meeting, tentatively planned for next Saturday.

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Chase Follows Through on Promise, Will Run for Virginia Governor as an Independent

Jacob Taylor

Virginia State Senator Amanda Chase (R-Chesterfield) is now planning to run for governor in the 2021 election as an independent candidate. 

The decision comes after the Republican Party of Virginia State Central Committee voted 41-28 on Saturday to hold a convention instead of a primary to nominate the party’s candidates for the 2021 races, according to previous reporting from The Virginia Star.

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Lynchburg Republican Party Loses Lawsuit Against Registrar’s Office Over Ballot Counting Practices

Corinne Murdock

The Lynchburg Republican Party lost in its lawsuit against the Lynchburg Registrar’s Office over ballot counting practices in this election. The two went to trial on Monday.
The lawsuit alleged that the registrar had failed one day to process absentee ballots with a Republican representative present, and had also failed to notify Republican representatives of preprocessing last Friday. The judge ruled in favor of the Lynchburg Registrar’s Office in under several hours.

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Lynchburg Registrar’s Office on Allegations of Improper Absentee Ballot Counting: ‘We Will Do Better in the Future’

Corinne Murdock

The Lynchburg Registrar’s Office maintains that allegations of improper absentee ballot counting were a result of an unintentional oversight of ballot law. No Republican officials were present per The Code of Virginia.
On Monday, the only workers present to process absentee ballots were “non-party affiliation.” Emails shared with The Virginia Star reveal that some of these workers had identified as Democrats up until last year.

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Lynchburg Registrar Accused of Counting Absentee Ballots Illegally Without Republicans Present

Corinne Murdock

The Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) and the Lynchburg Republican City Committee are accusing the Lynchburg Registrar’s Office of violating election laws by counting absentee ballots without Republicans present. Individuals who previously registered as Democrats for years assisted in counting ballots, this time registered as “non-party affiliation.”
65 of the “non-party affiliation” individuals were Democrats last year.

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Virginia GOP to Mark Herring on Ballot Fraud: ‘You’re in Contempt!’

Corinne Murdock

The Republican Party of Virginia (RPV) filed a lawsuit last week against Virginia’s Attorney General (AG) Mark Herring for failing to communicate changes to the witness voter requirement.

In August, Herring agreed with a federal judge to drop the witness voter requirement. It appears that these changes weren’t communicated well across the state. The RPV cites accounts of voters confused because their ballot language contradicts their voter instructions.

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Rich Anderson Is the New Chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia

Eric Burk

Rich Anderson is the new chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia. On Saturday, August 15, delegates from around Virginia voted in an unassembled election using a drive-through format. The ranked-choice results saw Anderson win round one with 48.80 percent of the votes, where incumbent Jack Wilson was eliminated. In round two, Anderson took 62.28 percent of the votes, defeating Mike Schoelwer.

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