One wing of Constitution Party has met and made their selections. LaFleur changes his mind about withdrawing.

Pat Powers

That was a quick change in direction. Last week we heard from Dr. Terry Lee LaFleur that he was not running:

I apologize to all of my supporters out there because all I have ever wanted to do was create a better, stronger future for the Good of all South Dakotans! However, the corrupt politicians of this sorry State want all of us under their thumbs until the day we all die.

Wherefore, the last act of my campaign is to endorse Billy Sutton as the next governor of South Dakota.

Read it here.

But in the meantime, that facebook post has mysteriously disappeared. And now we have a new post.  From Facebook:

Apparently LaFleur withdrew his withdrawal, and endorsement of Sutton, and is running on the Constitution Party Ticket. If they manage to get it to get past the judge later this week.

60 thoughts on “One wing of Constitution Party has met and made their selections. LaFleur changes his mind about withdrawing.”

  1. Lora Hubbel is strangely quiet today. I’m guessing her and Gordon Howie didn’t have their convention today.

      1. Can you text Ms. Hubbel and ask for us all what happened? Many are interested in her well being, given the mental instability and all. Is Mrs. Voleskey still about as she probably has some input. I just wish she’d bring Ron to the discussion with her.

        1. Joel Bergan and his wife were at the Ramkota convention today. They served as South Dakota delegates to the Constitution Party’s national convention this year, and it’s Joel’s understanding that the secretary of state’s office recognizes him as the legal state chair. Contrary to some of the information previously posted in comments to this blog, Bergan doesn’t intend to resign from that office until after Thursday’s hearing.

          The Ramkota convention was a smooth, orderly, disruption-free event with 15 voting delegates and around a dozen others in attendance. The party nominated Matt Johnson for U.S. House, Lora Hubbel for governor, and three additional candidates for the state legislature.

          Depending on the outcome of the hearing, the leaders of the convention are convinced that the secretary of state will eventually recognize this slate of candidates or none at all.

          1. It’s very interesting that Joel Bergman thinks he’s the chair because the National Constitution Party website still lists Lori Stacey as chair, and then the link provided for the state party goes right to a declaration by Micheal Gunn that he is the new chairman.

            1. (1) It isn’t “Bergman”; it’s Joel Bergan.

              (2) The national party website is wrong. Even Lori Stacey admits she isn’t the current chair.

              (3) After Lora Hubbel was legally elected as the new state chair in 2016, Lori Stacey never gave her access to the state party website (or financial records) for the entire seven months during which Hubbel served in that office. Last week, though, Stacey immediately turned over the website to Micheal Gunn, her handpicked and unilaterally appointed replacement as fake chair-treasurer.

              That former state party website reflects the views of Gunn and Stacey alone. The secretary of state’s office doesn’t recognize either Gunn or Stacey as chair.

              1. you “might” have some credibility if you put your name there…until then…not so much…if you claim to be an expert say who you are

                1. There’s only one state party. It’s much older than the Gunn-LaFleur faction, and as far as I know, it hasn’t yet replaced the website that faction stole.

                1. Joel Bergan was elected to a four-year term as vice-chair at the party’s 2016 state convention. When Lora Hubbel resigned as chair in 2017, the state party bylaws made Bergan the legal chair.

                  1. But he didn’t want to be state chair, right? And didn’t he appoint Stacey to it?

                    And if he was the chair all along, why did Lora Hubbel call the Ramkota Convention? If Bergan was the chair, why didn’t he call it? And if he’s been the chair since 2016, why is it the national Chairman didn’t know he was? Why isn’t it his name on the national website?

            2. Replying to Anne Beal @ 11:59 a.m.:

              Bergan was hesitant to take on the duties of the chair when Stacey first called to inform him of Hubbel’s resignation, but contrary to Terry LaFleur’s flirtations with perjury, Bergan never appointed Stacey as vice-chair or resigned as chair himself. In fact, he informed Stacey the following day that he’d decided to remain chair. She told him it was “too late,” which turns out not to have been true. It’s now clear that she hadn’t yet submitted any legal filings—financial or otherwise—to the secretary of state.

              After party members found out about Stacey’s malfeasance last month, they were informed by the secretary of state’s office that the party’s most recent filing pursuant to SDCL 12-5-14 still listed Hubbel as chair. With only hours left to file the convention notice, Bergan and Hubbel agreed to have Hubbel do so, even though they later determined that Bergan was probably the legal chair at the time.

              For months no one had known Bergan was still the legal chair, mainly because Stacey had misled them. The national chair now personally recognizes Bergan as the legitimate chair, but he’s no longer officially involved in the controversy. I don’t know anything about the national party website.

              1. How active is your party when it takes over a year to realize that you don’t know who the chair is?

                1. It’s hard to be an active party when Lori Stacey alone controls the entire party apparatus with an iron fist, and she doesn’t even live in South Dakota.

                  How active is your party when two dozen devoted members rebuild it almost from scratch in a little over a month?

                2. The reason they went a year without knowing who their chairman was is because the chair was supposed to be holding regular meetings and nobody was doing that.

                  From the outside looking in, it appears that only Lori Stacey was trying to keep the ship from sinking, and everybody else abondoned it. It’s pretty tacky to accuse the last man standing of malfeasance when all the rest of the crew bailed, and can be counted on to bail again. Lora Hubbel will be a Republican again as soon as the cycle of Lincoln Day Dinners comes around again.

                  1. Anne, Lori Stacey led everyone to believe SHE was the chair.

                    LORI STACEY wasn’t holding regular meetings, mainly because she didn’t live in South Dakota.

                    Those who abandoned the ship did so because CAPTAIN STACEY insisted on running it alone.

                    1. did anyone call for a meeting, call Lori stacy…more than one person to blame for this disfunction…anyone else think if the republican party didn’t hold a meeting regularly someone might call Dan and go what’s up? no because Dan actually has regular meetings

                    2. So… everybody believed that Lori Stacey was the chair, and allowed her to continue in that role for over a year, and call a convention, without anybody challenging her?

              2. Replying to Anne Beal @ 2:56 p.m.:

                No one knew there was anything to challenge. Party members only learned last month that Stacey hadn’t been carrying out even the most basic duties of the chair, including submitting the required filing pursuant to SDCL 12-5-14. As soon as they found out, they obviously did challenge her.

                1. yes because for a year the other members did nothing, never had a meeting…

                  non-party

            3. Replying to “not rocket science” @ 2:22 p.m.:

              People did call Lori Stacey. She was willing to talk and occasionally to listen, but in the end she was making every major decision—financial and otherwise—completely on her own. If anyone had problems with that, their options were to lawyer up or just back off.

              Due to the combination of Stacey’s personality and her flagging mental health, backing off proved to be only a temporary solution, so here we are. Your suggestion that she was a worse “party chair” than Dan Lederman, is one with which even Lederman’s sharpest critics could agree.

              1. No, they had another option besides lawyer-up or back off: call a meeting of the central committtee, hold an election, and replace Stacey as chair, which should not have been difficult if she had never been chair in the first place. But apparently nobody wanted to do that, and silence is consent.
                If the party central committtee knew she was calling herself the chair, knew she didn’t reside in the state, and didn’t do anything about this, they are complicit.

                1. She was registered to vote here and thus technically in compliance with state law.

                  If she’d been carrying out the basic duties of the chair, as she led everyone to believe she was, there would have been no way to remove her without litigation.

                  Even now, when nearly the entire party agrees that Joel Bergan is the legal chair, she’s fought tooth-and-nail to screw things up for everyone but her own little faction.

                  There’s no way she ever would have handed over the website and the finances because of any election before 2020. She explicitly said so.

                  1. Lori Stacey led everybody to believe she was carrying out the duties of the chair, except she wasn’t holding regular meetings as required, and nobody noticed. Nobody noticed? Not even the real chairman of the party, Joel Bergan? He didn’t notice? What kind of party is that?

                    1. Everyone noticed, Anne. It’s one of the main reasons state and national party leaders wanted Stacey out.

          2. How disruptive could an event be with 27 people there? Sounds like a joke. If this is all they could muster they are clearly not ready for prime time. LaFleur sounds like such a twit, and an egomaniac.

            1. (1) The party’s attempted meeting on July 14 had significantly lower attendance, and it was full of disruptions by James Bialota, the supposed new “state secretary” handpicked and unilaterally appointed by Lori Stacey.

              (2) Terry LaFleur is indeed an egomaniac, but he didn’t attend the Ramkota convention.

    1. Lines from the musical “1776” sung by Benjamin Franklin:
      “The eagle’s a scavenger, a thief, and a coward! A symbol of over ten centuries of European mischief!

      “The turkey is the truly noble bird. Native American. Source of sustenance of our original settlers. An incredibly brave fellow who will not flinch at attacking a regiment of Englishmen! Singlehandedly!”

  4. None of these candidates will get 5000 votes. I’d sooner elect Franklin’s turkey.

  7. Wow! Welcome back! I was worried you (and all those in your camp) had succumbed to RDD (Ravnsborg Defamation Disease) wherein all you can do is wish for a fourth or fifth or sixth or seventh candidate/dead horse you can crawl up on the soapbox and whip some more.

    This post is SUPPOSED to be about the Constituion Party as it “exists”…not your after-the-fact wishes since you didn’t get your way. Seriously, how many Super Bowls have the Vikings won in your world??

  8. @ Anonymous 11:42. Mary, let it go please. Don’t ruin your husband name buying pushing him to join the Constitutional Party. Fitz lost, its over.

    1. I doubt Mary is pushing her husband to seek the Constitution Party nomination for attorney general, since the convention was yesterday.

        1. Mary was–Fitz actually attended the Constitution Party’s 1st convention in Sioux Falls and changed his voter registration to Constitution party…

          1. Same as in 2002 Fitzgerald refused to endorse Larry Long and was a sore loser then also….don’t blame Larry Long or Ravnsborg, they won…I remember Long reached out to Fitz to be told he would not support him and we all saw Ravnsborg be gracious to both of his opponents at the convention in his acceptance speech.

            1. It says a lot about Fitz’s and his wife’s character that they are being such sore losers. No one likes to lose but why would anyone want to support him as an AG candidate if he can’t even be gracious in losing. Make me question if he was even capable to be an AG, i guess that is why he came in 3rd place.

                1. No you stop using my name. It is not copyrighted. Put your real name on here if you want no one to use it.

  9. i’m starting my own new party, the schmonstitution party, and none of you can have my vote ever. i’ll polish and comb it every day and keep it in a glass case on my mantle, which i installed just to have a place to display my vote even though i don’t have a fireplace. so there.

  10. Enquirer,

    If you serve beer, can I join? Or have a good smoker, I will cook ribs to earn my place at your feet.

      1. hmm, then there’ll be two of us. a fight for chairmanship could break out. gotta think about it.

        1. Enquirer gives Troy Jones a little taste of what it was like for Joel Bergan (and others) trying to serve on the central committee with Lori Stacey.

          “MINE! … GET AWAY! … MIIIIINE!!!”

        2. The Shmoos is the greatest threat to hoomanity the world has evah known, because they is so stoopid.
          An’ they only follow Li’l Abner.

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