A week after extremist Denver Riggleman lost out on being the Republican nominee in the Fifth District to uber-extremist Bob Good in a fixed VA GOP selection process uncertainty remains about what the November ballot will look like.
First off, there are four candidates in next week’s Democratic Party primary (Roger Dean Huffstetler; John Lesinski; Claire Russo; and, Cameron Webb). Thus, that is one slot with TBD.
As to the Republican slot on the ballot, not quite ready to use pen (e.g., something we can’t erase) to put in the name that will be on the ballot.
- Rep. Riggleman still seems to be considering challenging how the “convention” process was structured to put in the fix for Good. While, on preliminary look, such a protest seems unlikely to get anywhere, perhaps an extremist can unseat an uber-extremist.
- In addition, as with many other uber-competent Republicans in the Commonwealth, uber-extremist Good failed to submit properly legally required paperwork to be on the ballot. There is a July 9th Board of Elections meeting that could finish with a determination that this failure to follow basic legal requirements to be on the ballot means that Good won’t be on the ballot. Since Good failed (as, for example, did Nick Freitas) to be able to meet basic legally mandated tasks, if Riggleman fails to win a protest, it is possible that there might not be a Republican on the ballot come November and uber-extremist Good would have to run a write-in campaign.
And, to add to the confusion of the situation, Riggleman is dropping hints that he might run as a third-party candidate.
“Everything’s on the table,” said Rep. Denver Riggleman (R-VA) during an interview over Zoom with DC Correspondent Alana Austin. Riggleman says he’s not ruling out filing a legal challenge, or running as a third-party candidate.
“The Republican Party is broken, and someone like me needs to fix it, and I think the fear of me being in there is really what sort of precipitated this whole thing is that I’m not a politician like these people, and I scare the hell out of them,”
Lowell well captured the Wild West nature of the potential Fifth District ballot come November.
So…how about the Republican VA05 nominee (Bob Good) being forced to run a write-in campaign, while the incumbent Republican Congressman (Denver Riggleman) runs as a third-party, independent conservative candidate? If that happens, one would have to think that this Trump district, which has already moved from “Likely Republican” to “Leans Republican” in many political analysts’ ratings, would then move towards “Toss-up” or even “Leans Democratic.” And with, essentially, two Republicans running against one of these fine Democrats, things could get verrrry interesting on November 3rd! Stay tuned…
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