August 23 is the deadline for petitions for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, for U.S. Senate in West Virginia. The only candidate who attempted to qualify by petition is Jeff Becker of the Constitution Party. It will be several weeks before the state can check the petition to see if he has the required 1,756 valid signatures.
If Becker’s petition succeeds, there will be four candidates on the November 2010 ballot for U.S. Senate. The three ballot- qualified parties have nominees that are being chosen in the August 24 special primary. Those three parties are Democratic, Mountain, and Republican. The Mountain Party is an affiliate of the Green Party.
In other Mountain Party news, the party lost one of its four candidates for the legislature. At the regularly-scheduled May 11, 2010 primary, Robert Bryan Mills was on the Mountain Party primary ballot for House of Delegates, 51st district. He received zero votes in the primary. The Secretary of State has ruled that candidates cannot be deemed nominated, even if they were unopposed, unless they get at least one vote. Mills would have voted for himself but on primary election day, he had car trouble and couldn’t get to the polls. He lives in a rural area.
The special U.S. Senate primary is this Saturday, August 28 (not Aug 24 which would be today). Perhaps the legislature felt a Saturday would increase voter turnout over a traditional Tuesday workday election?
Anyway, yesterday I submitted 2215 signatures for U.S. Senate ballot access (1756 valid needed), and 2208 for waiving the filing fee (1740 valid needed). Based on our 80%+ validity rate for Phil Hudok for U.S. House, I am pretty confident of success.
BTW, the WVSOS confirmed to us yesterday that Phil Hudok made the ballot for U.S. House with just eleven (11) signatures to spare. There was most definitely some Divine Providence involved!!
Oops, that’s 2515 submitted for ballot access.
Also, the Robin Mills story doesn’t make any sense because, according to the WVSOS website, there are 46 people registered as Mountain Party in Morgan County, and another 29 in Hampshire county ( http://www.sos.wv.gov/elections/Documents/West%20Virginia%20Voter%20Registration%207.31.2010.pdf ). So of SEVENTY FIVE (75) registered voters in the 51st district, the Mountain Party could not get even one single supporter to the polls on primary day (or in the preceding three weeks)? If true, it sounds like the MP is on the way out.
The WVSOS candidate page was updated today for Phil Hidok and they still have Robin Mills listed: http://apps.sos.wv.gov/elections/candidate-search
Richard, what is the source of this story?