Free Republic

Concerned that DC Republicans might begin listening to voters rather than Karl Rove, an always sympathetic White House told stunned GOP leaders that “Cantor’s problem wasn’t his position on immigration reform, it was his lack of a position.” That is, Cantor wasn’t too liberal and he had not offended the conservative, Republican base with his promise of passing amnesty or his contemptuous decision to headline an April conference hosted by George Soros and organized labor. In fact if anything, the now defunct Virginia congressman had been TOO conservative! After all, hadn’t Cantor’s campaign sent out direct-mail pieces just before last...

NoVa freepers in Virginia's 11th congressional district - you have a choice to restore VA-11 to common sense conservative leadership. Ken Vaughn is a small business owner who is working to unseat Gerry Connelly. Ken's number one priority is the debt and spending. He is pro-life and pro-second amendment. We need your help. We need folks to help knock on doors, make phone calls - you name it and we can use your help. We can use financial support as well since we all know that money is essential to running any campaign. We need your vote on June 12th....

The race for Virginia’s open U.S. Senate seat is still virtually tied. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in Virginia shows Republican George Allen with 46% support to 45% for Democrat Tim Kaine. Four percent (4%) like another candidate in the race, and five percent (5%) are undecided.

ROANOKE, VA -- The Virginia Attorney General's office is investigating the campaign of Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich, over claims of ballot signature fraud. At the end of December, Gingrich told CNN that the reason he did not qualify for the Virginia primary, is because one of the people his campaign hired falsified a lot of signatures. The attorney general's office tells WSLS that the State Board of Elections asked it to investigate the claim. A spokesman for the attorney general's office emphasized that the investigation is not looking into Gingrich himself.

The House of Delegates tentatively passed a bill Thursday that would allow voters to write in names on primary ballots in Virginia. The concern was raised in December after former House speaker Newt Gingrich failed to qualify for the March presidential ballot and wanted to stage a write-in campaign. Virginia allows write-ins for general elections, but not primaries.

The State Board of Elections is asking Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) to investigate “irregularities” with signatures that presidential candidate Newt Gingrich submitted to get on Virginia’s ballot, board chairman Charlie Judd said Saturday. Gingrich’s campaign told state officials it had submitted 11,050 signatures. But a Richmond area firm hired to collect them turned in 1,500 signatures that appeared to be signed by the same person. “We hired somebody who turned in false signatures,’’ Gingrich told reporters late last month while campaigning in Iowa. “We turned in 11,100 – we needed 10,000 – 1,500 of them were by one guy...

Gingrich, Santorum, and Huntsman failed to qualify for the ballot too, you’ll recall, so Perry’s loss is also their loss. Which means, unless this gets turned around on appeal, the Virginia primary ballot will consist of Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, and … that’s it. Huge news considering that, er, Romney and Paul will almost certainly be the only two candidates left in the race on March 6 anyway.I said last month that I thought Perry had a real shot at success on the merits. The court actually agreed. There was just one problem: In his opinion, Gibney says Perry, and...

....[Gov. Rick] Perry, a states’ rights advocate, along with former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, are challenging Virginia’s residency requirement for people who circulate ballot petitions. Candidates must collect 10,000 signatures -- at least 400 hundred of them from each of the 11 congressional districts. As of the deadline, only Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas qualified. Timing is critical. Officials at the State Board of Elections say they need to mail absentee ballots by Jan. 21 to get them out 45 days before...

Mark Levin, being a disenfranchised Virginian, weighed in on the Virginia ballot fiasco, saying that the compliance rules were changed a month ago and that it is not the fault of the candidates. In fact, he believes the rules were changed to help shove Romney down our throats.

Newt says that one of his paid campaign workers turned in 1500 false signatures which killed his bid to get on the Virginia ballot. Algona, Iowa (CNN) – Newt Gingrich cited fraud Wednesday as the reason he didn’t get on the Virginia primary ballot. Last week his campaign acknowledged they used paid volunteers to scramble to get the required 10,000 signatures but fell short after the former House speaker and Virginia resident boasted his campaign was submitting as many as 12,000-14,000 signatures. On a campaign stop at an Algona chocolate store, the former House speaker said the “mistake” occurred because...

At the request of the Virginia Republican Party, the State Board of Elections voted 3-0 today to close the March 6 presidential primary and require a loyalty oath for participation. That means anyone who wants to vote must sign a form at the polling place pledging to support the eventual Republican nominee for president. Anyone who refuses to sign the pledge will be barred from voting.

Paul Goldman, a Richmond lawyer who is a former Virginia Democratic party chairman, is helping represent a conservative group in challenging Newt Gingrich's disqualification from the Old Dominion ballot on March 6, Super Tuesday. Bill Pascoe, executive vice president of Citizens for the Republic, said: “We are teaming up with former Virginia Democratic Party Chairman Paul Goldman to make sure the voters of the Commonwealth have a fair and transparent presidential primary process. ...

~~snip~~ "A Gingrich campaign official prior to the move by the Republican Party of Virginia said the problem is how the rules are set up, arguing that the party is, for apparently the first time, cross-checking the addresses that signature-givers gave against the electronic voter database file for accuracies. A name without a proper address match was tossed, the official said."

Virginia 2011 Independent Candidate for Legislature has Big Impact on 2012 Presidential Primary December 25th, 2011 There are currently many news stories and blog discussions about the Virginia presidential primary ballot access law. Some large blogs, such as Red State, have over 300 comments about the story. Some defend the current Virginia ballot access laws on the grounds that in past presidential elections, a fairly large number of Republican presidential primary candidates managed to qualify. But what has not been reported is that in the only other presidential primaries in which Virginia required 10,000 signatures (2000, 2004, and 2008) the...

There are currently many news stories and blog discussions about the Virginia presidential primary ballot access law. Some large blogs, such as Red State, have over 300 comments about the story. Some defend the current Virginia ballot access laws on the grounds that in past presidential elections, a fairly large number of Republican presidential primary candidates managed to qualify. But what has not been reported is that in the only other presidential primaries in which Virginia required 10,000 signatures (2000, 2004, and 2008) the signatures were not checked. Any candidate who submitted at least 10,000 raw signatures was put on...

Here's what it says on Newt's facebook wall: Newt and I agreed that the analogy is December 1941: We have experienced an unexpected set-back, but we will re-group and re-focus with increased determination, commitment and positive action.

I just started a new facebook page as a place for grassroots conservatives to urge Virginia to allow the leading Republican contender for the presidency onto the Virginia ballot. Gingrich is the Republican leader nationwide and in Virginia! It's absolutely ludicrous, if not criminal, for Virginia to deny the conservative base and tea party favorite a spot on the ballot while they promote their elite ruling class RINO! Do not allow Virginia to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of conservative grassroots voters who would mark their ballots for Newt Gingrich! Adding insult to injury, they don't even allow write-ins on their...

Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich's campaign attacked Virginia's GOP primary election system on Saturday for keeping him off the state's March 6 Super Tuesday ballot. The state party said that Gingrich, who lives in Virginia, had failed to submit the required 10,000 signatures to appear on the ballot. The Gingrich campaign responded that "only a failed system" would disqualify Gingrich and other candidates. It said Gingrich would pursue an aggressive write-in campaign, although state law prohibits write-ins on primary ballots. Gingrich campaign director Michael Krull said in a statement: "We will work with the Republican Party of Virginia to pursue an...

There is a simple fix to address the Virginia ballot situation in which only Romney and Paul qualified: All the non-Romney voters will simply vote for Paul, which will deny Mitt from winning VA. It won't hurt anything because Paul is not going to win many states anyway. The important thing is to keep Romney from the win, and let Newt finish him off in the other states.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich leads the pack of Republican presidential hopefuls in a survey of Virginia voters released Wednesday. But former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney would fare better than Gingrich in a general election contest with President Barack Obama, according to the Quinnipiac University poll. Gingrich leads Romney by a margin of 30 percent to 25 percent among Republican voters, with none of the other GOP candidates topping 9 percent. In a head-to-head test, Gingrich tops Romney by a margin of 47 percent to 39 percent. Virginia will hold its presidential primary March 6. More than half of the...