Candidate petition filing list for Vermont 2012 elections

by Taylor Dobbs vtdigger.org After an initially weak showing by Republicans in the last two weeks’ petition filing window, the party finished strong, fielding candidates for all statewide except Secretary of State.

(See full, unofficial list of all candidates below.)

Jim Condos will run unopposed for re-election, but all other incumbents in statewide offices will have to hit the campaign trail and beat out opposition, some in an Aug. 28 primary.

The filing period, lasting roughly two weeks, opened May 29. Republican gubernatorial candidate Randy Brock was among the first to file that day, but Republican candidates were hard to come by.

“At this point, that’s all I have,” Vermont GOP chairman Jack Lindley said in a May 29 interview, speaking about Wendy Wilton and Randy Brock, who besides incumbent Lt. Gov. Phil Scott, were the only Republicans to have announced their candidacy for statewide office.

The final tally, which is still unofficial pending validation by the Secretary of State’s office, lists seven Republicans running for statewide office. The final frenzy of submissions Thursday added Sen. Vince Illuzzi, who is running for auditor as a Republican, despite early rumors he would file as an independent; Jack McMullen, a Burlington-area businessman running for attorney general; John McGovern for U.S. Senate; and Mark Donka for the U.S. House of Representatives.

Democrats made a late addition to their field of candidates when Cassandra Gekas of the Vermont Public Interest Research Group (VPIRG) filed a petition Thursday for a run at the lieutenant governor’s office – one of the Republican Party’s only power positions in the Statehouse.

Multiple third-party presidential candidates were absent from the Secretary of State’s Thursday listing. A representative from Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s campaign brought petitions to the Secretary of State’s office Thursday, along with two volunteers from the campaign of the Justice Party’s Rocky Anderson. Independent presidential candidates must verify all voter signatures with the town clerk’s office in the municipality where the voter lives, and with 1,000 required signatures, members of the Anderson campaign said the process was onerous.

Below is the Vermont candidate petition filing list as of Thursday June 14 at 5 pm. THESE ARE STILL UNOFFICIAL – the Vermont Secretary of State's elections staff will be working through Saturday to verify and finalize a DRAFT list. This list includes the candidates that have filed. Petitions have not yet been verified. The Representative District Clerks and Senate District clerks have 72 hours to verify the petitions.

Secretary of State Jim Condos hopes to have the DRAFT list on the Elections website sometime over the weekend, with a finalized list on Monday. CLICK HERE FOR SECRETARY OF STATE'S WEBSITE. 

Unoficial Filing List as of deadline, June 14, 2012:

June 14, 2012 vtdigger.org Vince Illuzzi hands nominating petitions to seek the state auditor office to elections administrator Will Senning on Thursday. VTD/Alan Panebaker