Republicans’ write-in campaigns at the mercy of Demo(bureau)crats
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Evan Lips, communications director, MassGOP
WOBURN — Two Republican write-in candidates are questioning bureaucratic vote-counting standards in Democrat-run municipalities, with both encountering problems that Massachusetts Republican Party Chairman Jim Lyons said are a direct result of Beacon Hill’s Democrat-dominated leadership intentional negligence in failing to address the COVID-19 pandemic’s effect on state elections.
Rayla Campbell of Randolph, a Republican candidate for Congress who ran a sticker campaign to appear on the 2020 general election ballot, is still waiting on Boston election officials to finish counting and certifying her votes. Meanwhile, Randy Gleason of Dedham, a Republican candidate for state representative, says his campaign satisfied the state’s write-in threshold only to learn he was disqualified by state Secretary William Galvin for failing to submit his formal nomination acceptance letter by Thursday’s 5 p.m. deadline.
In Gleason’s case, however, the towns of Dedham, Westwood and Walpole failed to certify his campaign’s write-in votes before his Thursday 5 p.m. nomination letter deadline.
“Randy (Gleason) was required to somehow submit a ballot nomination acceptance letter without knowing whether he had satisfied the state’s ballot nomination requirements,” Lyons pointed out. “This whole process has failed him.”
Campbell, who is awaiting final certified results from Boston, is weighing whether to challenge the process in court. After the Legislature failed to address ballot signature thresholds, the matter was brought to the state Supreme Judicial Court, which chided Democratic leadership for having to do their jobs for them. The SJC ruled to cut ballot signature requirements in half, but never addressed write-in and sticker campaign requirements.
“Because the Democrat-led state Legislature intentionally chose to ignore the pandemic’s effect on signature gathering and write-in/sticker counts, Rayla (Campbell) finds herself in a situation where 7th Congressional District voters may very well be presented with no choice on their ballots other than a certified radical Democrat,” Lyons said, referencing incumbent U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, who counts “defunding the police” and “calling for unrest in the streets” as part of her legislative platform.
As of one week after primary day, it still remains unclear whether Campbell has satisfied requirements to appear on November’s general election ballot. The Randolph Republican also missed Friday’s state-mandated deadline to request a recount, since election officials in Boston have still yet to release a confirmed tally.
“This whole ordeal has been a disaster for Rayla and Randy,” Lyons said. “Incredibly, Democrats still claim mail-in voting won’t result in a similar disaster in November.”
