J. Tyler Ballance – When the checks on the vote counting process are insufficient, that is most unfortunate for both the victor and the loser. It taints the victory. Nonetheless, I don’t know whether the vote count was honest or not. I was not involved in the process, nor did I take the time to observe.

Until, I have specific evidence to the contrary, I think it best to assume the vote count was honest. Unfounded speculation of this sort may be fun, but it not fair to the reputations of the people involved.

Sorry that I didn’t get to meet you Citizen Tom at the Convention.

The RPVA provided a voting process that could have been manipulated by the District Chairmen, or those operating the counting machines, or even a few of the people shuffling the collected ballots. Whether any impropriety happened, we will likely not know, unless someone gives a death bed confession, or perhaps an insider rats on someone.

The root of the suspicions about the process are coming from the visual evidence that there were a lot more people wearing Marshall and Jeff Frederick stickers and many more Marshall signs being waved, yet Gilmore was the reported victor; no recount or audit of the process allowed.

AFTER the Marshall-Gilmore vote, over five hundred people left who had come just to vote for Marshall, then Jeff Frederick won a landslide victory (over twenty percent margin by some accounts). By both pre-election polling and estimates made at the Convention, it appeared that those supporting Bob were also supporting Jeff, with Jeff having some additional support among the Gilmore “old guard.” It is possible, though implausible, that many of those wearing Hager stickers still voted for Jeff. I don’t know anyone who expected the difference between the Gilmore-Marshall vote and the difference between the Frederick-Hager vote to be substantially different, so how did Jeff get such a huge margin, even though about five hundred of his likely supporters from the Marshall camp took off before the second vote?

Bob Marshall ran a principled campaign and Virginia has been robbed of the chance to have a truly great statesman in the Senate.

While I sometimes differ to a small degree on some political points with Mr. Marshall, I know as a fact, that anyone, from any walk of life, can depend on Bob Marshall to place the well being of our People first, and to always support and defend our Constitution.

Bob Marshall will be back.

Jeff Frederick will bring a new era of professionalism and integrity to the RPVA and has pledged to ensure that in any races held during his tenure as Chairman, that all of the candidates will be supported in the same way with everyone treated fairly.