Bill Introduced by Sen. Jake Knotts Would Remove Political Parties From Primary Filing Process
Chairman Betty Poe and Officers of the Greenville County Republican Party held an urgent special called meeting Monday night with House members of the Greenville County Legislative Delegation to formulate plans to block House passage of a Senate passed election bill sponsored by Sen. Jake Knotts.
The bill that would strip political parties of their candidate selection authority and give it to Election Commission bureaucrats was rushed through the Senate. It was proposed as a solution to the problems created by conflicting laws and an arbitrary court decision that removed more than 100 primary candidates from ballots due to a technicality that had been previously ignored. The bill received unanimous approval of the Senators voting who had little time to read or discuss the fallout from implementation of the legislation.
Supporters of the Knotts bill assumed that government employees can do the work of political parties more accurately than party volunteers. Greenville County Republican Party leaders resent that implication. Documentation of all Republican candidates in Greenville County was properly handled. Failure of the system was the result of failure by the Legislature and Election Commission to issue clear instructions and failure of state party officials to insure communications between state government and county party leaders.
Greenville County Republicans were stunned to learn from press reports that the bill had received an endorsement by state party Chairman Chad Connelly.
The Greenville County Republican Party Executive Committee has been on record favoring registration by party in South Carolina and currently has a court case pending asking for the current election law that allows any registered voter to vote in Republican primaries and select Republican candidates to be overturned and changed by the legislature based on constitutional grounds. The Knotts bill would push the political parties further away from being able to conduct their own affairs.
Former Greenville County Republican Party Chairman Samuel Harms in a message to party officers said the Knotts bill “would prevent the Greenville County Republican Party (or any county party) from collecting the statements of intention of candidacy from candidates who want to run as a Republican. Instead, under the Knotts bill, the state government would now decide who was qualified to run as a Republican.”
House members attending the special called meeting agreed to return to Columbia and and in the remaining few days of this legislative session, do whatever is necessary to delay passage of the bill until a review of all the election laws can be completed and sound laws passed that maintain the integrity of the election process and respect the role of political parties that are private organizations, not government entities to be bullied by elected officials, judges they appoint to the bench or bureaucrats they appoint or hire.