Why has the Chair of the Virginia Beach Democrats been trying to put Republicans on the Democratic sample ballot, and why has she been undermining Democratic campaigns? Why did Republicans get on the sample ballot mere days after making $1,000 donations?

[Update 1/4/19: The VBDC has voted to remove Carla as Chair. More info here: https://medium.com/@WilliamM/breaking-virginia-beach-democratic-chair-removed-kicked-out-of-committee-8ee453bbef5]

The accusations in this article are strong, but the conclusions I have come to are based on mountains of evidence. My sources consist of no fewer than five people who are active members of the Virginia Beach Democratic Committee. Additionally, I was sent a 42 page PDF of grievances against the Chair, including a petition signed by numerous members of the VBDC calling for her removal, and dozens of screenshots of online conversations. Finally, I have listened to multiple recordings of conversations that took place regarding the problems with Carla’s leadership, including one where she damaged efforts to help a Democratic candidate facing a scandal.

Congressman Scott Rigell (R)

Carla Hesseltine’s time as Chair of the VBDC was marred in controversy from the beginning. Her Republican ties raised eyebrows, with one Daily Kos blogger accusing her of being a Republican. Of particular note is her long-running support for Scott Rigell, the Republican who represented the 2nd Congressional District before Scott Taylor. Carla was pictured speaking at a fundraiser for Rigell, and even wanted him to run for Senate.

Additionally, her public voting history indicates that she voted in the Republican Primaries for both President and Congress in 2016. This was despite claiming to be a “lifelong Democrat” when she ran for Chair. This also means she lied on a form she signed when she became a Hillary delegate stating that she never participated in another party’s nomination process. More questions regarding Carla’s loyalties emerged shortly after she was elected.

Fighting Democrats; Helping Republicans:

At first Carla seemed to get along with most of her Steering Committee. In particular her Vice Chair Lisa, who had run as her ally. However, behind the scenes she was actually working to undermine her own Treasurer, Mike Maskell, in his run for City Council.

Maskell was running against incumbent Republican Jim Wood. It turns out that Carla and Jim Wood have known each other for years, and that Carla is friends with Jim’s mother. Carla actually wanted to have Wood recommended on the official Democratic sample ballot over Maskell, but that idea was shot down during the Summer.

The sample ballot is crucial to a candidate’s success in City Council elections. City Council elections are “non-partisan” and candidates do not get a (D) or (R) next to their name, so many voters only know who is supported by each party based on the sample ballots.

If you are shocked that the Chair of a Democratic committee would put a Republican on the official sample ballot over a Democrat, you better brace yourself, because we’re just getting started!

Selling the Sample Ballot:

When the Steering Committee of the VBDC convened to create the sample ballot, they made a questionnaire, which was sent to all candidates, along with a rubric to score it.

However, once the results came in Carla insisted on repeatedly changing the process, presumably because she wanted different results. It is now known that Carla wanted Ben Davenport— a Republican who took part in a fundraiser with Scott Taylor and has endorsed many Republicans— on the ballot, as well as Wood.

It was at this point that several members of the Steering Committee resigned. One of the key resignations was that of Emily Hoapili, who had been the Outreach Chair. Here is what she had to say:

Eventually the Steering Committee had enough and decided to vote on a ballot guide, regardless of Carla’s wishes, despite the fact that Steering had become more friendly to Carla after the resignations. This vote resulted in a guide that left off Wood and Davenport, but included Maskell and all other Democrats.

However, this is not the end of the story. Another local Republican, Louis Jones, and Davenport, had a trick up their sleeve. Jones wrote a $1,000 check to the Committee, as did Davenport’s parents. A few days later they were both on the sample ballot.

Jones was in direct contact with Carla regarding the donation.

Just how Republican are Davenport and Jones?

Davenport was a guest of honor at a fundraiser for Scott Taylor within a week of being added to the sample ballot. His presence was specifically used as a way of advertising the event and encouraging donors to attend so that they could “personally know Councilman Ben Davenport”.

Davenport has endorsed Republicans in the past, including Delegate Jason Miyares. Here are some choice highlights from Miyares’ endorsement list on his site.

Carla’s support for Louis Jones is even more stunning, because he is a well-known right-wing Republican with a history of racially insensitive remarks. On one recent occasion Jones had the temerity to victim-blame an unarmed black woman who had been killed by police in Virginia Beach, even though she did nothing illegal. He also endorsed Scott Taylor.

He is not exactly a new or unknown face, as he has served 36 years on the Council so far. His loyalties are proudly displayed by the Republican Party of Virginia Beach:

A Democrat Endorsed Candidate…

It was only at this point that the ballot guide was announced to the whole committee. Jennifer Leister, a member of the committee, explains that the backlash was swift since “the general membership had never been consulted at any point throughout the process, and many knew that Davenport and Jones are Republicans”. Virginia Beach Democrats all over social media were in an uproar. Many demanded a vote, or at least a chance to express opinions, as had been the standard in the past. However, the ballot was announced during the last VBDC meeting before the election, so there was no chance for any general membership input or questions at any point throughout this process. For many people the decision to include Jones in particular was a bridge too far.

Two leaders stepped up at this point to try to democratize the process — Kimberly Tucker and Yvonne Leonard. They created a petition demanding an emergency meeting so the ballot could be discussed, and so the general membership could have a say. One member who signed the petition remarked that “We need to have a true dialogue. We need to have transparency. None of us have all the answers, and the only way we are going to move forward as a party is if we work together as a committee.”

As evidence came forth that both Davenport and Jones are Republicans, some members of Steering realized their mistake and were willing to take them off the ballot. Since time was running out before the election, and faith in the Steering Committee was waning, they had to come up with a new standard quickly. The most obvious solution was to only include VBDC members. This unfortunately left off other candidates who were uncontroversial, but were not VBDC members.

At this point Carla Hesseltine totally blew up. Although she acted like she would go along with the new ballot at first, that same night she sent out an email to Steering insisting that she had the dictator-like power to unilaterally determine who would be on the sample ballot.

There’s a lot to unpack here, but the most important takeaways are that Carla doesn’t care what Steering thinks (let alone general membership), she takes it as a personal slight when people disagree with her, and she is willing to sink literally every down-ballot Democrat to make her point. If it is not clear from the last screenshot, she is in fact threatening to leave off all down-ballot races, basically holding the sample ballot hostage until she could get the Republicans she wanted on it. Additionally, several sources told me that Carla’s claim that School Board candidates wanted to be left off the ballot is untrue. Logically they would have no reason to want to be removed from the sample ballot.

Carla soon began to stall for time as criticism and petitions started coming in. Eventually, she faced a rebellion within the Steering Committee, and some members sent out an email recommending down-ballot candidates including Mike Maskell. However, Carla stalled for more time by demanding that nothing be put on social media until the following afternoon. It was that afternoon that a new scandal broke, this time in Carla’s favor against Maskell.

Undermining a Member of her own Steering Committee

All of my sources have told me essentially the same story when it comes to how Carla has treated Mike Maskell. Not only did Carla not stand by Maskell’s campaign — she actively tried to undermine it from the moment she became chair.

After her efforts to get Maskell’s Republican opponent Jim Wood on the sample ballot failed, Carla began finding other ways to undermine him. One example is this odd exchange where she engages in a hostile debate with an elected official who endorsed Maskell. Why would a Chair go out of their way to attack a councilman who had just endorsed a Democratic candidate?

Note: Leigh Anne Bowling was a Democratic Candidate for House of Delegates in 2017

I agree with A.J. Vasta here. “Thank you for your support” would have been the appropriate response. Why did Carla go after Councilman Moss so harshly and get into this protracted debate (which continued beyond what I have included here)? He just endorsed your candidate in his last post! Why did Carla feel this conversation needed to happen, and publicly at that? Why did Carla want to drive Moss away at a time when he was reaching out and supporting a member of her Steering Committee?

Carla wasn’t done. Shortly after this exchange a video came out compiling a number of comments Maskell had made privately on Facebook.

What the video comes down to is he made a series of immature jokes, none of which referenced anything non-consensual, illegal, or hateful towards any group of people. For example, he joked that he “sometimes wrecks hotel rooms with [his] penis”. Carla tried to paint this as sexist. For what it is worth, four of my sources — all women — have told me they thought it was absurd that Carla moved to remove him from the sample ballot over this, and none of them were offended. One even said that she “watched the video three times trying to find something offensive. [She] never found anything”. For several of them, this was the final straw that made them want to come out and criticize Carla.

Former Steering Committee member Emily Hoapili, who resigned in response to Carla’s sample ballot shenanigans, stressed the negative precedent this decision sets. “For Mike to have given so much of his time and talents to the VBDC, it’s unacceptable for them to turn their backs on him after bad jokes that weren’t racist, sexist, or inciting violence…Look at the numbers. If he had been on the sample ballot, he could have closed the margin. And the message this sends to any members considering running for office is just bad”.

I recently gained access to a recording of the conversation where Steering members discussed how to handle the controversy. Mike read a draft of a statement he was going to release, and various members of the committee explained what they thought should be changed and how he should handle questions from the media. They were all business-minded and professional. Except Carla.

Early in the call she said “I’m not interested in your campaign or what you will do in that aspect”. Her other comments throughout the call were limited to saying she would not defend him, she wanted him off the ballot, she thought his comments were gross, and she wasn’t sure how he came up with those jokes. She focused on the personal, rather than the professional. In addition to those talking points, which she repeated multiple times, she compared his jokes to the actions of Kavanaugh and Trump. Here is how the conversation went:

“Carla: I didn’t agree with Donald Trump’s locker room talk.

Mike: The key difference is at no point did I talk about assaulting or harassing anybody.

Carla: I think you’re splitting hairs

Mike: That’s a pretty thick hair

Carla: Oh, ok…hopefully you’ll contain it before anyone in the press gets ahold of it.”

Mike was kept on the ballot at that time. Shortly thereafter the video did, in fact, get to the press.

Regardless of whether one thinks Maskell’s jokes were appropriate or not, any comparison of jokes to actual sexual assault is not only absurd, but deeply insulting to those who have actually suffered sexual assault. All of the women I have spoken to defend Maskell, so I feel comfortable saying that Carla was using this comparison for political reasons, rather than out of genuine concern.

One member of the VBDC pointed out that “If [Carla] couldn’t get Wood on the sample ballot, getting Mike off that ballot was the next best thing”. This would also explain why Carla was willing to risk having no down-ballot races on the sample ballot at all.

Maskell was eventually taken off of the sample ballot only a couple weeks before the election, crippling his campaign, since otherwise Carla would not have allowed any sample ballot. Jim Wood cruised to victory, giving Republicans a key seat on City Council.

Representation, Unilateral Leadership, and Leaving Members Voiceless:

Representation on the committee is another consistent issue. Jones being on the ballot disturbed people not only due to his Republican ties, but also because of his history of racially insensitive remarks. All of my sources, regardless of race, find it disturbing that Carla only appointed white people to positions on Steering after her election. Several of my sources pointed out that Carla is often in conflict with black members of the VBDC. One black member said she felt Carla’s personal distaste for her was partly connected to race.

Although Carla ignores complaints in general, there was a meeting where she called on everyone who wanted to speak, except for one black person. One of my sources, a woman of color, stated that she believes “if a white person brought up these issues in committee [Carla] would have taken it more seriously”. This is essentially the story I hear from every person of color I have talked to. Carla’s biases may be subconscious, but they have a significant detrimental impact on her leadership ability. At best, Carla does not care about diversity or a having committee that represents the community.

This is a part of the larger problem of Carla shutting out voices other than her own. She unilaterally removed the Committee’s 19 year old web designer from his position because he liked a tweet pointing out her Republican ties. She wanted to remove the President of the Virginia Beach Young Democrats, the only remaining person of color on Steering at that time, from her position. Carla was unaware that the Young Democrats are a separate organization, and their President is guaranteed a spot on the committee regardless of what Carla wants.

When Carla came under criticism from over a dozen members of the committee for her unilateral, counterproductive, and poor leadership, she singled out two black women and claimed that they threatened her. One of them was Kimberly Tucker, the organizer for Indivisible 757, and an employee of the national progressive organization Indivisible. Carla’s justification was that Kimberly said she was so upset by all of the problems on the committee that she would be willing to hold a protest outside Carla’s house. I have seen this comment in context, and it was obvious hyperbole. Of course, no such protest ever happened. The comment was meant to emphasize that people are not going to to shut up about these problems.

But Carla wasn’t done.

Next she went after Kimberly’s job.

Threatening someone’s job, someone’s paycheck, someone’s ability to live, is much more serious than Kimberly’s tongue-in-cheek remark.

Carla tweeted at IndivisibleTeam while saying that they — as a national organization — did more harm than good. (This is absurd by the way; Indivisible Movement does great work). Indivisible is a non-partisan progressive organization, so they criticize anybody who deserves it. All my sources have told me that Indivisible stands with Kimberly. Nonetheless, Carla kept trying from early April through at least October.

The image below was also included in this tweet

Let’s talk about an actual threat.

These screenshots come from an argument Carla got into on the Virginia Beach Democratic Committee page. A former School Board member, Leonard Tengco, accused the Committee (not a particular individual) of selling itself by allowing Jones and Davenport to buy spots on the sample ballot for $1000. This is only part of the argument, which went on for dozens of comments.

People say mean things on Facebook all the time. A Chair can not use the official Democratic Committee Facebook page to engage in such petty arguments. On top of that, they definitely can’t threaten a local politician — or anybody for that matter. Also, let’s be honest, saying that the men in your family want to meet someone you are arguing with in person is a threat. That is incredibly inappropriate to post as the official committee page. There must be consequences for this, especially since she has done stuff like this before. Carla has no right to complain about what other people are saying when she goes around threatening people and trying to get people fired.

All of this is about Carla centralizing power around her and pushing out others.

The Solution

These events have set a series of terrible precedents for the VBDC. First, support for Republicans, particularly in the context of the donations that they gave shortly before they were added to the sample ballots, shows that there is a pay-to-play politics at work within the Democratic Committee. Second, Maskell’s removal from the ballot furthers to perception that Democrats are weak and divided. It shows that if the Chair dislikes you on a personal level, you can’t expect support — even if you are on Steering. Worse still, it is known that a local Republican activist was behind the video. Bowing to this pressure encourages further such attacks in the future.

Most of my sources called Carla a Republican plant, or “probably a Republican”. Yvonne Leonard, a long-time member of the committee said “I think Carla is a Republican plant — a successful Republican plant”. Only one said she did not think this was the case, instead chalking up Carla’s failures to “gross incompetence” and “pettiness”.

Regardless of intent, Carla Hesseltine’s tenure as Chair of the Virginia Beach Democratic Party crippled multiple Democratic campaigns while boosting multiple Republicans. The way she pushes out minorities, young people, and those who criticize her has done lasting damage to the party, and is the exact type of politics that makes people not want to become involved.

Carla needs to go. And the sooner the better.

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Correction 11/15: The original version of this piece said that Davenport hosted a fundraiser for Scott Taylor. He actually did not host it, but was a guest of honor. His presence was used in advertising for the event, and the chance to “personally know” him was mentioned as an incentive to attend and donate.