Newt Gingrich Blames Virginia Ballot Failure On 'One Guy'

WASHINGTON -- Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Wednesday blamed his campaign's failure to produce the required number of signatures in order to appear on Virginia's primary ballot on "one guy," whom Gingrich said "frankly committed fraud."

The Republican Party of Virginia announced early Saturday that the former House speaker had not turned in the 10,000 verified signatures the state requires in order to appear on the ballot for the state's March 6 Republican primary.

Gingrich's campaign initially announced it would pursue a write-in campaign, but upon learning that Virginia law prohibits write-in candidates in primary contests, it changed its tune, promising to pursue "alternative methods" for getting on the ballot.

But on Wednesday, Gingrich told a crowd gathered in an Iowa chocolate shop that the reason his campaign's 11,100 signatures weren't ruled admissable was because "we hired somebody who turned in false signatures. We turned in 11,100 -- we needed 10,000 -- 1,500 of them were by one guy who frankly committed fraud."

Gingrich isn't the only candidate struggling to explain why he is not on Virginia's primary ballot. On Tuesday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who also failed to amass the required 10,000 signatures, filed a lawsuit against the Republican Party of Virginia, claiming that precedents set in federal courts should override Virginia's laws.

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Comments

[atexasdem]

03:06 PM on 12/30/2011

I thought he'd say it was all Obama's fault.

[ritamary]

12:33 AM on 12/30/2011

Newt cannot organize his followers in his home state to gather 10,000 signatures, and he thinks he should be president? Talk about a legend in his own mind...

[undaunted8]

10:49 PM on 12/29/2011

Well when it comes to using his fingers he actually has the experience...

[susanbsbi]

06:42 PM on 12/29/2011

So nice of him to blame somebody else, when all the signatures were from on district, not all 44 districts. It is Gingrich's personal fault, for not being on the ball, with the requirements of the state he lives in. By the time the VA race comes around both Gingrich and perry will be at the bottom of the list.. I just hope that who every he claims committed the fraud ins't arrested, as I doubt if there was any fraud because the RNC of VA would have announced it.

[Rabindra Permesar]

05:56 PM on 12/29/2011

the guy committing frauds name is Tywen Hcirgnig

[JohnBryansFontaine]

05:10 PM on 12/29/2011

Is Newt Gingrich Running for POTUS or Working at the Chocolate Factory?
by Crystal Wright

http://townhall.com/columnists/crystalwright/2011/12/29/is_newt_gingrich_running_for_potus_or_working_at_the_chocolate_factory

[RepsSuck]

04:50 PM on 12/29/2011

So Newt couldn't get enough signatures, dummied some up, turned them in, got caught, and then screamed he was a victim! More Republican dirty tricks!

[jdwlor]

04:36 PM on 12/29/2011

So this is why all the red states are passing laws to surpress voting because of all the fraud,sounds to me like the laws they have now are working pretty good.And just think it was a republican that committed fraud.

[RepsSuck]

04:30 PM on 12/29/2011

Republicans are good at ONE thing: they give us prior notice of what they will be doing THEMSELVES, not long after they accuse OTHERS of doing it! (Karl Rove thinks it confuses people, but he is obviously just a ham loaf with glasses!)

[Jeff1958]

06:11 PM on 12/29/2011

Count me as another Colbert fan...

[too young but old enough]

02:55 PM on 12/29/2011

{sarcasm}
Sounds like ACORN is up to their old tricks again...What's that? This is about a Republican? Then I am sure that this is all about the actions of one rogue individual, and we should ignore the charges so that the candidate can get his name on the ballot anyway. We can only call this 'fraud' if it's been perpetrated by Democratic supporters.
{/sarcasm}

[exclintonsupporter]

02:54 PM on 12/29/2011

Doesn't matter...what matter's is that these guys never had a chance of being President in the first place...they are wasting precious time!!!

[politicaljunkie41910]

02:17 PM on 12/29/2011

According to MSNBC, Gingrich was out paying people to obtain signatures on the eve of the deadline for turning in the signatures. $1 per signature and a bonus $2 per signature if you turned in more than 1000 signatures. This was a situation ripe for fraud. If Newt had actually been running for president and had a ground game, it would have only required 50 supporters to collect 200 signatures. A legitimate campaign could have done that in a couple of hours standing outside of Walmart, or at any one of his campaign rallys where according to reports, people were turning out in large numbers to hear Newt.

[charweb]

01:54 PM on 12/29/2011

Must've been Obama

[Jeff1958]

01:51 PM on 12/29/2011

"One guy" was directly responsible for 13.5% (1500/11100) of the signatures?

There are 7,900,000 people in Virginia, Newt. Why did you only get 11,100 to join you? [That's 0.1% of the population.]

[DrHopeful]

01:49 PM on 12/29/2011

The process of electing a president in the United States has become bizarre. Much less time, much less money, and simpler rules are in order.

[ritamary]

12:38 AM on 12/30/2011

You think gathering 10,000 signatures is too difficult a requirement for someone running for president? Well maybe we could just pick a name out of a hat. That would be simple enough.