State GOP to announce state senator vacancy as two plan to resign

CHARLESTON, W.Va.— Kanawha County Republican Executive Committee Chairwoman Dianna Graves says with the interest she has already received about filling the two senator vacancies, she doesn’t foresee them failing to submit names to the governor when the time comes.

Dianna Graves

“There’s so much interest in these seats already, it’s crazy the number of people who have called me and texted and emailed about these two seats,” Graves said. “We’re going to have three people on these two lists.”

Senators Eric Nelson from the 17th senate district and Mark Hunt from the 8th senate district will resign Monday. Nelson will become Governor-elect Patrick Morrisey’s state Revenue Secretary and Hunt will become the new state Auditor.

Graves said that the process for each vacancy is little different because the 17th senate district represents Kanawha County, and the 8th senate district represent several different counties.

She said that the state GOP, in both instances will announce that there is a vacancy.

“Usually, what the process is, the state GOP will post an announcement on their website, they may use some other forms to notify people that the vacancy has happened and encourage them to apply,” Graves said.

After the GOP receives resumes and applications they will be given to a Vacancy Committee from the 17th senate district, who will then conduct interviews at the state GOP headquarters. Once they’ve interviewed the candidates they will discuss and narrow it down to three names. Those names will be then submitted to the governor.

As for the 8th senate district, Graves says she does things a little differently.

“I chose a subcommittee, list of people that I put together from the voting committee members and that subcommittee will meet,” Graves said. “The same thing happens where the state GOP posts on their website, but they will forward all the resumes to me though. I’ll get my subcommittee to meet at the state GOP headquarters, we’ll interview all of the candidates, we’ll narrow it down to the list of three and submit it to the governor.”

Both the Vacancy Committee and Graves have 15 days, from the time the vacancy happened, to submit their list of three names to the governor, in which he will have five days to select the candidates he wants to fill the spot. However, if either committee fails to submit their lists on time, then the governor will still have the five days to select someone of the same party affiliation to fill the spot.