Contact:
Evy Hines
Communications Director, United National Committee
(816) 944-9118
[email protected]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Hammons Exploring Legal Action Against Tennessee Sec. of State

Austin, Texas, September 4, 2020 (Friday) – The Unity Party of America Hammons/Bodenstab Presidential campaign (https://billisrunning.com/) is exploring legal action against Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett.

The email to Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett reads as follows:

Subject: We’re Exploring Legal Action Against You, Mr. Secretary

• On Thursday, August 20th @ 10:05 am we filed 399 signatures with your office, along with the completed Elector form
• On Friday, August 28th I emailed Ms. McDaniel for the 2nd time asking for an update (she did reply the 1st time)
• On Tuesday, September 1st I called Ms McDaniel @ 8:07 am
  • She indicated to me that the Electors were not an issue
  • She did tell me that the list of Candidates on the page https://sos-tn-gov-files.tnsosfiles.com/2020%20Presidential%20Candidates.pdf was final and that we therefore did not make the Presidential ballot
  • I asked if there would an official notice of insufficiency in writing provided, she implied not necessarily, and volunteered to email me the number of actual signatures of ours which were approved
• At 9:00 am on Tuesday I emailed her to follow up for that signature information
• At 9:07 am on Tuesday I emailed the Blankenship campaign to trade notes, seeing as how I found it very strange that the Constitution Party candidate wouldn’t have been able to collect 275 valid signatures in Tennessee (he had been listed on the “Pending” list but not on the “final” list)
• At 10:44 am on Tuesday I received an email from the Blankenship campaign that they had been told that their signatures were still being counted
• At 11:21 am on Tuesday I emailed you directly asking for clarification
• On Wednesday @ 8:07 am I received the forwarded email from Ms McDaniel
  • She informed us that only 204 of our signatures had been approved
  • She also wrote: “All petitions have been reviewed and the list on our website is accurate.”  THIS STATEMENT IS PATENTLY FALSE.
  • My chrome browsing history indicates that I indeed accessed https://sos-tn-gov-files.tnsosfiles.com/2020%20Presidential%20Candidates.pdf one last time on Wednesday and still didn’t see Mr. Blankenship on the “final” version of the list
• I emailed the Blankenship campaign on Wednesday @ 8:16 am to give them a heads-up that they (apparently) hadn’t made the final list either
• On Thursday @ 5:37 pm I received an email from the Blankenship campaign that they had been “Certified in Tennessee.”
• On Thursday @ 6:27 pm I received a text back from the Blankenship campaign confirming that they had indeed only been informed that afternoon (so either you’re waiting multiple business days to inform Presidential campaigns [after weeks of waiting] that they’ve made the State’s Presidential ballot, or I’ve been lied to)

Mister Secretary, I don’t know what to believe at this point and Mr. Bodenstab and I feel at this time our only chance of getting reliable information from your Department is to take you to court.  A signature rejection rate of 49% is remarkably high (keep in mind my own tally of 399 includes neither crossouts nor a single P.O. Box voter), and for all I know Ms McDaniel, mistakenly believing that she was looking at final numbers from the counties, gave me a far-from-complete tally (I assume that, since we submitted our signatures with less than two hours to spare, we were [are?] at the back of the line for signature verification).

I’m on https://www.tnmd.uscourts.gov/ as I type this, and rest assured I’ll be mentioning in the press release being sent out to our nationwide 1,000-journalist media list this morning that we’re looking for a few good lawyers.  See you in court.

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About Bill Hammons

Bill Hammons was raised in Odessa, Texas of Friday Night Lights fame, earned a B.A. in English and American Literature from NYU, managed Rights at Newsweek Magazine for seven years and seven days, and moved to Colorado for the running trails before completing his journey home to Texas with a move to Austin, and before making a little bit of history by becoming the first third party candidate in Colorado history to petition onto the State’s General Election ballot and the only one ever to do so single-handedly.  His website is https://billisrunning.com/.

About Eric Bodenstab

Eric Bodenstab grew up in California before moving to Colorado and earning two Master’s Degrees, one in Structural Engineering.  He is a married father of two sons, lives in the Denver suburb of Arvada, and is the Chairman of the Unity Party of Colorado.  His website is https://ericforallofus.com/.

This communication paid for by the United National Committee.  Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.