Posted on 07/25/2018 6:52:05 AM PDT by Sam_Damon
Don Blankenship, the former coal baron who spent time in federal prison and finished third in the West Virginia Republican primary in May, is wading back into the state's U.S. Senate race, this time attempting filing paperwork to run as a member of the Constitution Party.
Blakenship tweeted photos of himself filing the paperwork on Tuesday, saying in part, "I am the only candidate who cannot be bought by out of state billionaires and I will work hard to drain the swamp."
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
IOW he’s trying to get the Rat elected...out of spite.
Don’t care, no one is going to vote for him and he’s likely not going to get on the ballot anyway.
BINGO!
There was an earlier thread reporting this turn of events. The real question is what will be done about this and how will it be resolved. He is clearly violating the Sore Loser Law, but if he is on the ballot, the law means nothing.
Yes. He obviously wants the Dem to win.
It stinks, but sore loser laws are Constitutionally problematic.
I assume that he has the Constitutional right to *run* for the office but does he,or anyone,have the basic right to be included on the ballot?
Send this fat murderer back to jail
It was posted a while ago. Had a different title
This turd is so egocentric he only sees himself. Refuses to face facts
I’m not sure it’ll have the impact everyone thinks. WV is a weird state that is heavily old school Democratic as opposed to the new international socialist variety who dominate their party in Washington.
Trump carried the state with something like 70% of the vote but Manchin remains the slight favorite. At first blush, it doesn’t make sense. The national Democrat brand is becoming toxic, which is why Governor Justice switched parties to the GOP. But, he’s also switched back and forth through the years. So, take from it what you will.
But, Manchin has bucked his party enough to survive his last election, and I suspect that he will again, whether or not Blankenship gets on the ballot. His opponent is originally from NY, grew up in NJ and Manchin is from WV. It’s weird and dumb that it should make a difference, but from what I hear, it does. Blankenship grew up in WV and is a familiar name, so he might well siphon off more votes from Manchin than Morrisey. I’d like to see some 3-way polling, but who really know how useful polling is anymore.
The Constitution does not envision nor make any provision for the existence of political parties.
Therefore sore loser laws lose all point of legal reference.
I recall that, in Joe Lieberman’s final election to the Senate, he had actually lost the Democratic primary, so he was not the Democrat nominee that year.
He ran as an independent candidate in the general election, and won election as an independent.
And didn’t Lisa Murkowski lose a Republican primary in Alaska, but her supporters put together a write in campaign, and she won an election as a write in candidate?
The government has the responsibility and obligation to organize and execute orderly and fair elections. The interests of the voter are paramount, not the candidates. Candidates who will not or cannot follow the rules to appear on the ballot should be excluded except as a write in. Sore Loser laws were created to foil those who want to game the system, similar to other rules requiring proof of eligibility, petitions with voter signatures, etc.
You make a good point, but such situations are never done to favor all voters, it is done to give an advantage to a particular group of voters, masked as “a choice”. The real objective is quite the opposite. That’s why such laws are adopted, and when they are set aside it is almost always the act of a corrupt judge or judges. Certainly that was the case in this example.
Somehow this got missed from FReeper attention.
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Well try these two threads if you be interested....
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3656888/posts
Blankenship Says He’ll Run Third-Party In West Virginia Senate Race ^
May 21, 2018
84 Comments
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3656975/posts
Don Blankenship announces spoiler’s bid in West Virginia Senate race ^
May 21, 2018
36 Comments
You’re right. In fairness, I missed the earlier threads.
Only thing I’ll say is this story was updated with Blankenship actually filing the paperwork in the WV Secretary of State’s office. The other threads had him saying he would.
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