Robert Sarvis officially on U.S. Senate ballot

The Sarvis for Senate campaign has received notification from Virginia’s Board of Elections that Robert Sarvis has qualified to be on the statewide ballot for U.S. Senate.

Unlike the Republican and Democratic candidates, who enjoy protected status and did not have to submit any signatures to be on the ballot, Sarvis submitted over 19,000 total signatures to ensure he met the requirement of 10,000 valid signatures from registered Virginia voters, including 400 from each of the state’s eleven Congressional districts.

“The ballot-qualification process is designed to be long and arduous, to minimize competition against the vested interests that control our politics. That makes it all the more important that we rise to the occasion and meet the requirements, in order to give Virginia voters the opportunity they deserve: to reject cronyism, partisan deadlock, and politics-as-usual, and to vote for an open society that champions freedom and equality—a Virginia and an America that is Open-minded and Open for Business.”

Sarvis will be on the ballot statewide. He will be joined by at least six Libertarian candidates for the House of Representatives:

• Bo Brown, running in the 4th Congressional District.
• Paul Jones, running in the 5th Congressional District.
• Will Hammer, running in the 6th Congressional District.
• James Carr, running in the 7th Congressional District.
• Jeffrey Carson, running for an open seat in the 8th Congressional District.
• Bill Redpath, running for an open seat in the 10th Congressional District.
• Marc Harrold, running in the 11th Congressional District.

Last year, Sarvis ran for governor and received a higher vote total than any third-party gubernatorial candidate in the South in forty years. He says that he decided to run for federal office this year “because all of the themes from my campaign last year are still relevant, even more so with respect to the federal government’s overreach and failings.”

Sarvis says he will reach out to the Virginia Bar Association about their scheduled debate in late July, and to other prospective debate hosts. “Now that I am on the ballot, I expect to receive an invitation. Excluding me would be an insult to the 145,000 Virginians who voted for me last year and to the millions of Virginians who want and deserve a sincere and substantive debate on the important issues facing us.”

Sarvis challenged his opponents to declare whether they support his inclusion. “I call upon Ed Gillespie and Mark Warner to demand that I be included in the debates. It’s the right thing to do for Virginia voters. I am willing to debate either or both of them at any time, at any location, under any conditions.”