Adrian Wyllie has resigned his post as chairman of the Libertarian Party of Florida (LPF), leaving in something of a huff. He opposes the only Libertarian candidate currently running for the U.S. Senate in the Sunshine State in 2016.

Independent Political Report broke the news that Wyllie, who had been the party’s gubernatorial candidate in 2014, announced his resignation Wednesday.

“It has become clear that my attempt to defend the party from violent fascists is now perceived by many members to be more dangerous to the party than the threat itself,” Wyllie announced in an email. “Therefore, I resign as chairman of the Libertarian Party of Florida. I resign from all posts in the LPF. I withdraw my membership in the LPF. All actions are effective immediately.

“I once believed this party would always stand unwavering to defend our core principles,” Wyllie added. “I now know there is little left to defend.”

Augustus Invictus

Wyllie’s resignation came after a motion of no confidence was directed against him but swatted down by the executive committee of the LPF. The motion focused on Wyllie’s outspoke opposition to Augustus Invictus, the only candidate so far for the party’s nomination in the 2016 U.S. Senate race. There is considerable buzz that Republican strategist Roger Stone could run as the Libertarian candidate in 2016 Senate race.

Speaking to Sunshine State News on Thursday, Wyllie said he resigned his post due to his opposition to Invictus.

“I was incapable of remaining silent over the threat to the party,” Wyllie said, insisting Invictus and his supporters were “fascists” and pointing to his support of eugenics.

This motion of no confidence failing led LPF Vice Chair Lynn House to resign.

“Because 10 members of the EC have voted to support the chair’s position that he may speak for the LPF on matters of his personal opinion without approval from the EC, and in doing so have willfully voted to violate Bylaw provision Article III, Section 3a and Standing Rule Article VIII, Section 1; because this is the second time the LPF has ignored its own rules, the first time being at convention when the delegates ignored provisions for previous notice; because our bylaws are a contract with the membership; because fraud is deliberate deception to secure unfair gain; and because initiating fraud is a violation of the NAP, I find that the LPF EC has knowingly violated the terms of a contract and has defrauded the membership, thereby violating the NAP,” House wrote. “Therefore, I am in good conscious compelled to resign my position as Vice-Chair of the LPF EC, effective immediately. It is not my intention to resign my membership or change my voter registration. I would like to remain chair of the Membership Committee and active on the Communications Committee.”

Invictus, an Orlando attorney, weighed in late on Wednesday on Facebook.

“Today Adrian Wyllie announced his resignation as chair of the Libertarian Party of Florida. I regret that Mr. Wyllie has had to step down. Despite what my detractors may believe, this was never my goal," Invictus wrote. “I urge my supporters not to gloat or to revel in any apparent ‘victory'- for truth be told, this is a loss for all of us, and a sad day for the party. Neither should my detractors fear retaliation or harassment. Though you have sought my banishment from the party, I will not seek yours. Though you have spent the past four months fuming with hatred for me, I want only constructive cooperation for the growth and betterment of the party.

“That all Libertarians might work together - whether members of the LPF or not - is my primary goal,” Invictus added. “America looks to the Libertarian Party as the hope for disrupting the two-party system, and we must pull together in order to have a chance at that. Therefore we must not seek to further divide ourselves with infighting and finger-pointing, bragging and pouting. We must let go of our differences and push forward, forgetting old hatreds and working toward a common goal. Fellow Libertarians, be not in dismay for the present crisis, but be hopeful for the future.”

Wyllie and other critics have pointed toward numerous controversial remarks in Invictus’ writings. Invictus graduated from DePaul Law School and sent a letter in 2013 to his classmate renouncing his U.S. citizenship and predicting civil war in America.

“I have prophesied for years that I was born for a Great War; that if I did not witness the coming of the Second American Civil War I would begin it myself,” Invictus wrote. “Mark well: That day is fast coming upon you. On the New Moon of May, I shall disappear into the Wilderness. I will return bearing Revolution, or I will not return at all. War Be unto the Ends of the Earth.”

Wyllie and other critics of Invictus also note the Senate candidate wrote a paper in law school in which he supported eugenics.

“We have a duty to implement legislation to prevent the births of persons with mental retardation, inheritable diseases, severe physical handicaps, and psychological disorders,” Invictus wrote. “In other words, we have a duty to implement, through state legislation, an official eugenics program. Should we continue on our present anarchical path, American society, and the world in general, are doomed to ruin; but should we implement a eugenics program, humankind may once more find its strength.”

Back in December, responding to his critics, Invictus wrote an essay and inisted that he had changed his mind to government-led eugenics but still insisted it was legal.

“I still believe the legal argument to be valid, I disavow the public policy argument that states should implement eugenics programs,” Invictus wrote. “This change in perspective has come from my experience in law and politics. When working with theory – which is to say, when working in a vacuum – one can build the most glorious castles, draft the most ingenious battle plans, and divine the very essence of objective reality. But when one attempts to bring this theory into practice, one finds that the castle was made of air, that even the best battle plan can be ruined by what Clausewitz calls ‘friction,’ and that reality is the Nietzschean world, not the world of Plato’s Forms. There comes a time when the scholar must realize the absurdity of believing that distilling life in books does not alter the truth of life; and if that time does not come for the scholar, then he shall forever remain blinded by his conceit.

“In the world of theory, I do not find the underlying values of this paper to be objectionable,” Invictus continued. “If two parents know that their child will be born with Huntington’s Disease, and that the child will die a horribly painful death by six years of age, it is the most reprehensible act imaginable to bear that child anyway, simply to satisfy some selfish desire of the parents. Neither should it be controversial that we might prefer intelligent people to stupid people; healthy people to ill people; able-bodied people to crippled people; four-limbed people to dismembered people; beautiful people to ugly people; strong people to weak people. This obsession with egalitarianism – this notion that we must all be treated as equal no matter how irresponsible or reckless that notion is, no matter how divorced from reality or counter to all common sense – this obsession has wrecked every last shred of dignity our once great country did possess.”

At the campaign website, Invictus’ team insists eugenics remains legal but should not be pursued by the public sector.

“In the year 1927, the Supreme Court ruled in Buck v. Bell that the state of Virginia was permitted by the Constitution to sterilize those the state found ‘unfit’ as part of a eugenics program,” the campaign posted on the site. “Between 1907 and 1963, more than 64,000 people in the United States were victims of eugenic sterilization at the hands of the state. The National Socialist government of Germany would later cite the results of these programs as proof that large-scale eugenics programs were feasible. This abuse of power continued well into the 1970s, where more than 5,000 Black and Native American mothers on welfare were threatened with losing their welfare benefits unless they consented to sterilization. Though most voters today would find such practices unacceptable, Buck v. Bell has never been overturned. We would be inclined to agree with those voters. No ruler or group of bureaucrats should have that sort of power over another person.”

Critics including Wyllie have also slammed Invictus who for questioning democracy and being dismissive of women’s sufferage and giving minorities the vote in an essay published last year.

“It is true that women and racial minorities have been allowed to participate in the processes of government to an extent previously denied categorically – though it cannot be said that this has ever made government ‘better,’” Invictus noted in the essay published last May. “We must ask ourselves: Do these meager benefits outweigh the chaos and disorder, the cultural degradation and political mediocrity, which are characteristic of democratic government?

“Some will doubtless argue vehemently that the lessened probability of violence, the restraints on the great men of history, and the inclusion en masse of minorities and women in government are not ‘meager benefits,’ but are, rather, great advances in human civilization,” Invictus added. “We will have to agree to disagree on that point. The real conflict is ‘under and behind and inside everything [we] take for granted.’ It is in the inevitable discord between those who believe in democracy as the Summum Bonum, as the final end of human socio-political organization, and those who do not. The true believers wish to see monarchy, caste, custom, and tradition all swept away in favor of the ‘right’ of all individuals to cast a meaningless ballot for issues of which they know nothing. They see all previous and alternate forms of government as the instruments of tyranny and bigotry, of evil and ignorance; for surely we are better than our ancestors, embracing as we do our enlightened democratic ethos.”

The Invictus campaign website attempts to respond to the candidate’s essay, insisting it was “intended as a critique of democratic government” instead of questioning extending sufferage to women and minorities.

Sunshine State News tried to reach the Invictus campaign at a number listed at the campaign website but it was out of service. Sunshine State News also emailed the Invictus campaign but no response came before the deadline.

In recent years, the Libertarian Party has been making some progress in the Sunshine State. Wyllie took 4 percent in the 2014 gubernatorial race while former Gov. Gary Johnson, R-NM, pulled 1 percent as the Libertarian presidential candidate in 2012.

Asked by Sunshine State News what’s next for him, Wyllie answered, “A sabbatical as I contemplate political retirement.”

Reach Kevin Derby at kderby@sunshinestatenews.com or follow him on Twitter: @KevinDerbySSN