After wasting everyone’s time and nearly wasting thousands of dollars, the West Virginia Republican Party has decided not to appeal the decision of the Kanawha County Circuit Court to throw our their lawsuit against the West Virginia Secretary of State.

The WVGOP was suing because of their belief that the law passed during the special session of the West Virginia Legislature allowing for the special election to fill the unexpired term of the late U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd called for two separate and distinct elections – a special election for the Senate seat, and the general election. Secretary of State Natalie Tennant combined the special election and general election into one ballot. The main complaint of the WVGOP was there should have been at least to separate straight party voting options instead of one for the entire ballot.

From their press release:

The West Virginia Republican Party will not further challenge the Special Election ballots constructed by the Secretary of State.

“We’re confident that a challenge of the lower court’s opinion last week to the West Virginia Supreme Court or the Federal district court would be successful,” said WV GOP Chair Mike Stuart. “We believe the ballot was constructed to provide partisan advantage by Secretary Tennant’s office. Despite the clear language from the Legislature, our chief elections officer decided to ignore them and the advice of a bipartisan collection of county clerks around the state who thought the ballot questionable.”

“Time is running short,” said Stuart. “Though we are absolutely confident in our position, we can’t afford for this ballot issue to remain the central point of this campaign. Making sure to debate Obama’s policies and those of his endorsed candidates Joe Manchin, Mike Oliverio and Nick Rahall is the most important thing.”

“If we fail to send John Raese, Shelley Capito, David McKinley and Spike Maynard to Washington, our state will be forever doomed to a devastated economy where coal is targeted for destruction.”

Of course, we could find out at the end of the day that Stuart didn’t mean to be quoted and they pull the press release like they did last week.

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