VA State House: On Friday, days after election officials rejected his appeal to get on the ballot, GOP Del. Nick Freitas announced that he’d run a write-in campaign to keep this 60-36 Trump seat. Freitas will face Democrat Ann Ridgeway this November. House Speaker Kirk Cox said later that day that, while Virginia Republicans had explored the idea of trying to get someone else listed on the ballot as the party’s nominee, the party had decided that their best option is to back Freitas’ bid.
House Majority Leader Todd Gilbert didn’t sound so enthusiastic about the idea the previous day, though. On Thursday, after a former Freitas aide wrote a Facebook post accusing the party of trying to stop the delegate's write-in campaign in order to get a new Republican nominated, Gilbert responded, “Oh YOU must be the mastermind behind the scenes who would rather run a write-in campaign than try to get a Republican on the ballot in an otherwise safe district when control of the state government is at stake.” However, Gilbert said of Freitas on Friday, “We are fully on board with everything we can do to help him return to Richmond.”
Freitas got into this situation after he failed to properly file candidacy papers, and election officials rejected the local GOP’s attempts to award him the nomination anyway. However, Freitas’ very much could end up winning this fall in this very red seat despite not being listed on the ballot. Freitas’ campaign manager estimated last month that a write-in campaign could cost up to $150,000 but said that the campaign has $500,000 in the bank. Team Red will very dismayed to be spending anything, though, in a year where their narrow 51-49 state House majority is very much at risk.
P.S. The last time a write-in campaign succeeded in Virginia was 1989 when state United Mine Workers leader Jackie Stump defeated Democratic Del. Donald McGlothlin.