If Amanda Chase is going to return to the Virginia state Senate next year, she’ll first have to defeat “felonious” allegations that she is no longer a member of the Republican Party.
Despite her credentials as an outspoken conservative — representing the 11th Senate District for eight years and describing herself as “Trump in Heels” — in March the Chesterfield County Republican Committee informed Chase that she had violated state party rules, effectively relinquishing her membership in the Republican Party of Virginia.
Chase argues it was not her but her critics who violated party rules, part of a “nefarious” attempt by “bad actors” to settle personal vendettas and spoil her political comeback.
After losing reelection in a GOP primary last year, Chase hopes to return to the Senate by replacing John McGuire in the 10th District. McGuire is running for Congress in the commonwealth’s 5th Congressional District, and if he defeats Democrat Gloria Witt this November as expected, his seat closer to home will be up for grabs.
Multiple Republicans aim to fill the vacancy, seeking their party’s nomination for a special election expected to be held in early January.
Chase is one of them. By moving from Chesterfield to Appomattox County this year, she now resides in the 10th and would be eligible for the nominating contest.
Her eligibility assumes, however, that she is still permitted to partake in party activities. According to an email sent to Republican leadership last week, she is not.
“This communication serves as formal notice of her current membership status within the Virginia GOP,” reads the Sept. 24 email. “She is currently barred from participating in any party activities until April 19, 2028.”
The email was sent by Carey Allen, chairwoman of the 4th District Congressional Republican Committee. Allen told The Daily Progress she sent it because she wanted to inform Appomattox Republicans that Chase is not permitted to join their committee, or any Republican committee for that matter.
“I don’t think we should reward people who don’t support Republicans,” Allen said in an interview, referring to the original source of the controversy.
Last June, after losing to Glen Sturtevant in a GOP primary, Chase is alleged to have asked for the floor during a Chesterfield committee meeting and announced that she would not be supporting Sturtevant in the general election, calling him “dishonorable.”
Allen and others argue that is a violation of the state party rules, which can require members express support for all Republican nominees. Additionally, the rules say that a committee member is “deemed to have resigned” from the committee if they announce their support for any candidate other than the nominee.
A May letter addressed to Chase includes screenshots of social media posts in which Chase alludes to starting a write-in campaign against Sturtevant. The letter concludes she had “relinquished” her membership in the Republican Party of Virginia.
“You don’t have to go out and raise funds and actively campaign for someone if you dislike them, but you can’t stand up and say you’re not going to support them,” Allen said.
Chase is not backing down. In an interview, she told The Daily Progress that Allen and her “goons” are making baseless accusations to discredit her and hurt her chances for the Republican nomination in the special election.
“Carey Allen is a liar. She has no integrity. The only thing she has is a vendetta,” Chase said.
According to Chase, the entire matter is an issue of “sour grapes.” Chase and Allen backed different candidates in a board of supervisors election. Chase’s candidate won, and she believes Allen is seeking revenge by damaging her prospects.
“I am the front runner in this race and they are afraid of me,” she wrote in an email to supporters. “They know I will win.”
According to Chase, Allen’s Sept. 24 email to Republican officials — addressed to 5th District Committee Chairman Rick Buchanan — was slanderous and outside of Allen’s purview, in part because Chase now lives in the 5th Congressional District and says she has never lived in the 4th.
In a letter of her own, Chase told Buchanan on Friday that Allen’s allies violated the party plan and “illegally kicked me out of the party.”
The state party plan is not a legally binding document. It is not clear who will ultimately decide Chase’s fate. Rich Anderson, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia, did not respond to a request for comment from The Daily Progress. Neither did Jeff Ryer, who heads the 1st Congressional District committee and who both Chase and Allen have been in contact with.
This is not the first time Chase has been accused of failing to support a nominee.
In 2019, when Chase was a sitting senator running for reelection, the Chesterfield committee found that Chase had been promoting the candidacy of an independent candidate for sheriff.
A detailed letter to Chase accused her of funding campaign ads for the independent candidate, “launching a social media attack campaign” against the Republican nominee and ignoring party members who asked her to stop.
“These are actions that the Republican Party will not condone,” reads the 2019 letter, signed by former Republican Party of Virginia Chairman Jack Wilson and former Chesterfield committee Chairwoman Tara Carroll.
It gave her three days to “take corrective action” by removing certain social media posts and publicly stating she would not support the independent candidate. Three days later, Carroll sent Chase a letter claiming Chase did not do as requested.
“Since you chose not to take advantage of this opportunity to remain a member of the Committee, the loss of membership is automatic and now in effect,” Carroll wrote in a decision that barred Chase from party activities for four years.
Chase won reelection anyway, characterizing the ordeal as an attempt to sabotage her campaign. Both then and now, she believes that her political adversaries abused their power.
“Any time they made an assertion, they never called me, they never asked my side of the story, which is a complete violation of the party plan. They never did an investigation,” Chase said.
Allen said Chase had 30 days to appeal the most recent decision but never did. And she noted that, in March of last year, Chase signed a pledge vowing to support Republican nominees. The document specifically cites two articles in the party plan that Chase is alleged to have violated.
Allen and Chase are looking at the same party plan but reaching very different conclusions.
“It’s not a disagreement over how the party plan is written. That’s pretty clear,” Chase said. “She’s acted illegally. She’s accusing me of doing things that she herself is doing. That’s how crazy this is.”
Chase believes the matter will be put to rest on Tuesday night when she expects to be granted membership in the Appomattox GOP.
Allen doesn’t see how that’s possible. In a Friday email to Anderson and other Republican leaders, Allen wrote it was “unequivocally the end of the road” for Chase.
“She is fundamentally ineligible to be a member of the party. There are absolutely no grounds for further consideration,” Allen wrote.
For Allen, the rules are clear. Chase violated them, and party leadership would be giving her a pass if she is allowed to join the Appomattox committee and partake in a special election.
Chase is claiming “election interference.”
“It’s her desire to create enough confusion out there so that people don’t think they can vote for me. That’s really what this is,” Chase said. “I’ve not been kicked out of the Virginia GOP. I’ve not been legally kicked out of the Chesterfield GOP. There’s no ‘here’ here.”
Source: www.dailyprogress.com
Be First to Comment