Tennessee G.O.P. Removes Trump-Backed House Candidate From Ballot

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: New York Times

The Tennessee Republican Party voted on Tuesday to drop Morgan Ortagus, whose bid for a House seat was endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump, from the primary ballot. Scott Golden, chairman of the state Republican Party, said the vote to remove Ms. Ortagus and two other candidates, Baxter Lee and Robby Starbuck, from the Fifth Congressional District primary “was all about their voting records.” None of the three had met the party’s requirement of having voted in three of the last four statewide primaries, he said.

The Republican-led legislature previously failed to bar Ms. Ortagus from the ballot with the recent passage of a new residency bill that requires House candidates to have lived in “this state and the district” they want to represent for at least three years. Ms. Ortagus moved to Tennessee in early 2021, according to a campaign spokeswoman, but the residency bill didn’t become law in time to disqualify her from the ballot. Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, held on to the legislation until after a critical April 7 candidate filing deadline.

“I’m a bona fide Republican by their standards, and frankly, by any metric,” Morgan Ortagus, a former State Department spokeswoman, said in a statement. “As I have said all along, I believe that voters in Middle Tennessee should pick their representative — not establishment party insiders.” Of the 16 members of the party’s executive committee who voted on this issue, 13 supported removing Ms. Ortagus and Mr. Starbuck, and 11 voted to remove Mr. Lee, said Mr. Golden. He pointed out that nearly all members of the executive committee who cast votes were Trump delegates to the national convention two years ago.

Julia Bruck, director of communications for Secretary of State Tre Hargett, said in an email that political parties had until Thursday to remove people from the ballot who they deem are “non-bona fide candidates.” Mr. Golden said, “When you are seeking to be elevated” from party member to candidate and potential office holder, “you have to meet a higher standard.” The sponsor of the residency bill, State Senator Frank Niceley, made it clear he was opposed to carpetbaggers, a phrase used in politics to describe candidates who run for office in places they have no ties to.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/20/us/politics/morgan-ortagus-tennessee-primary.html

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[Slammer]

1. living space

From what little I've read about it, their issue with her is that she's from out of state and has never actually lived in Tennessee, despite having done enough to technically establish residency there (aka renting or owning a place where she could in theory live plus probably changing her drivers license).

And that they don't have a problem with her being tied to the Trump administration or having Trump's endorsement.

Honestly, once you have twelve people from the same party running for the same office, including experienced politicians and officeholders, a party really shouldn't stretch to do any favors for people who might appear fringy to the voters and keep those people in the running.

[Martin68]

2. Ooooh! Trump is gonna love that!

[riversedge]

4. too bad.

[not fooled]

3. She got to be a "star" on Maddow last night

but not in the way she would have wanted--Maddow played clips of her getting quizzed about Tennessee history and her district--she flunked, spectacularly. Should be a source of major embarrassment but these GQPee tools don't have shame, plus it's probably a positive to prospective GQPee voters to be ignorant.