Loudoun County Republicans, Unity, Integrity, and Whatever Shall We Do About Shawn Williams?

Update below.

Those were the recurring themes at last night’s Loudoun County Republican Committee meeting.Shawn Williams has stepped down as Vice Chairman of the board but continues to represent the Broad Run District on the board. [read_more]

Only one Supervisor in Loudoun will face an opponent at the Republican convention in May, Ralph Buona. His opponent is Joe Scalione, a former LCRC district chairman. Joe is well known in the community and is running because he wants to serve. As someone who believes in personal responsibility and integrity, Joe said he called Ralph Buona and asked if the board of supervisors would put pressure on Shawn to resign. Joe is hearing from people in his district that Shawn should step down and he agrees. Scalione said Ralph told him no, the board will not ask Shawn to step down nor will he face any discipline from them. Ralph Buona took the stage and said the same thing. Shawn must come to the decision to resign on his own with his family and his workplace.  Buona also said we must have empathy for Shawn because he is ‘one of us, a member of our family’.  Many committee members did not share that feeling. Ralph urged patience, implying if we wait long enough Shawn will make the right decision and resign on his own without the board having to do anything. No leadership is necessary.

Other board members are upset that pressure is being put on them to encourage Shawn to resign. Somehow their discomfort is our fault. The people of the community are to blame when as recently as late 2013 Shawn’s wife was afraid of him. When her father called the sheriff’s office to send deputies to Shawn’s house because his daughter was afraid, her father referred to Shawn as a ‘violent’ person.  No doubt the neighbor Shawn punched last summer would concur in that description. While we have great sympathy for Shawn’s family it seems obvious what needs to happen. He needs to resign from the board of supervisors and get the help that he so desperately needs so that he and his family can heal.  We pray for Shawn and his family. Why is the leadership in Loudoun so afraid to lead? Why can the community see what needs to happen and our leaders cannot?  “It’s not that simple” is the common refrain from our ‘leaders’. Yes, it really is that simple, but no one wants to lead the way in making it happen.

With two contested Republican races this year, one for Ralph Buona’s seat and one for Sheriff, our long time treasurer, Roger Zurn, expressed concerns that the losing candidates in these races will leave the Republican party to run as independents against our chosen Republican candidate. His fears are well founded since that has happened in every local election since 1999. It happened in 1999, 2003, 2007 and again in 2011.  Will history repeat itself?  Will one of the 4 candidates run as an independent when they don’t win the Republican nomination? Zurn asked each of the four candidates that question. Three of the four candidates empathically stated they would not run as an independent. Sheriff Chapman was out of the room when the question was asked.  When he returned he said he would not run as an independent although he didn’t say it with quite the conviction of the other three.

Perhaps Sheriff Chapman has considered a run as an independent?  Parts of his speech lead some to believe that. Despite being the incumbent, and despite an evening dominated by words like integrity and party unity, Sheriff Chapman felt it necessary to criticize his opponent and to lie while doing it. He talked about silly things, like his opponent and another deputy in his office using pseudonyms when commenting on blogs and online newspapers.  Who would care?  There were also some emails criticizing the action of the sheriff. Again, who would care?  Doesn’t everyone criticize their boss at some point?  Doesn’t everyone object at some point to how their office is managed? From what I have heard there was plenty to criticize about the manage of the sheriff’s office. Apparently Chapman cares a great deal about such criticism. Chapman said his opponent and former deputy, Eric Noble, had lost his security clearance from the FBI and that’s important when one is Sheriff. As Chapman well knows, the only reason Eric Noble doesn’t have a security clearance right now is because he doesn’t have a job. duh. He’s retired. When he returns to work as sheriff the security clearance will immediately be reinstated. During his speech Chapman’s people passed out a flyer that had the appearance being ripped from the headlines of the National Inquirer.  It was a very strange tabloid piece that impressed no one.  Normally it’s not the incumbent who goes on the attack like this, it’s the challenger. Does the Sheriff have internal polling showing him the underdog, because that is how he’s acting. Is Chapman attacking Eric Noble in preparation for a bid for sheriff as an independent?  Since he has pledged not to do that, we all hope that he is true to his word. It’s all about integrity and party unity.

Sheriff’s Chapman’s comments about Eric Noble, and his tabloid hit piece, prompted more than a few people to write checks to the Noble campaign for sheriff.

More on Shawn Williams continuing story, with his statement of resignation from Vice Chairman of the board of supervisors here, and here. 

UPDATE: Shawn Williams goes after Commonwealth Attorney  here because Jim Plowman held Williams responsible for his own actions.  Why is our Republican board of Supervisors allowing this?  A disgraced supervisor is now attacking our Commonwealth Attorney with impunity.