Questions and Answers:
Why a printed/written petition?
Many modern petitions are "on-line". I do NOT trust on-line, and I suspect many would agree.
Further, we do NOT want names and addresses of those participating to be available to anyone but ourselves and the RPK. We do NOT want anyone mining the data and adding people to email and phone lists. That is why we do NOT want the emails and phone numbers of the signers to be provided to RPK. RPK already has access to lists of voters, their addresses, their phone numbers, etc. If they want to call someone on the list, they do not need us to give them a phone number.
IMPORTANT: We are NOT going to be asking for anything on the petition that is not already publicly available.
Is there a deadline?
No, there is NO deadline. Until the name of Mitch McConnell is removed from the headquarters this will be an on-going campaign.
Most Republicans in Kentucky have no idea that the name Mitch McConnell is on their party headquarters in Frankfort. I know this from phone surveys I have conducted. At the very least this campaign will get the word out.
From the phone surveys I know that MOST Republicans want that name removed. But RPK is NOT going to believe us if we say so, they are only going to believe it if people put their names down, and sign saying that they want that name removed.
We expect the RPK leadership to RESIST removing the name. We expect they will defend McConnell, no matter how often he votes with Democrats. For that reason we need signatures, and we need a lot of signatures. The more signatures that we have, the less effective RPK's defense of McConnell will be.
We want to expose Kentucky Republican politicians who bow the knee to McConnell. We want it to become routine for voters to ask their Republican politicians, "Did you sign the petition to remove McConnell's name from the headquarters of the RPK?" And if they lie about it, we will check and we will report. This petition will become a litmus test for whether a politican is a real conservative or a pretend conservative like McConnell.
How will the results be tabulated and compiled?
As each petition is received, a number will be assigned to the page and the individual petition pages will be filed in numeric order.
A spreadsheet will be maintained, listing each name, address and county for each person who signed one of the petition pages. Each name will have the petition page reference listed.
For example, having all the names in a single spreadsheet will allow us to be able to search the list for duplicates (which will be removed). If someone wants to make sure that we received their petition and/or signature, then you can simple email Robert Barney:
barneyrobertlaverne@gmail.com
and the spreadsheet will be searched to see if their petition was received.
The results of the spreadsheet will be reported to RPK once we hit 1,000 names. That will be followed up by press release. Further press releases will be published as we hit milestones like 5,000, 10,000, 25,000 etc. Yes, I believe those numbers are easily achievable providing people understand the IMPORTANCE of getting McConnell's name removed.
What if someone changes their mind?
If you sign the petition, and later believe that you have made a mistake, or you have changed your mind, simply email Bob Barney at:
barneyrobertlaverne@gmail.com
and provide your name, address and county. Your name will be STRUCK from the petition list. If we doubt it was you that requested it, we will contact you to make sure it is you.
This is NOT a game; this is VERY serious. We want a longstanding record of those who OBJECT to the name Mitch McConnell being on OUR headquarters in Frankfort. We believe Mitch McConnell has become an embarrassment for the majority of Kentucky Republicans, and we we believe this is our way to let the rest of the country know how we feel.
Will RPK respond?
We believe that they will be forced to do so at some point. When a "censure" of Mitch McConnell was adopted by about 9 Republican county parties in 2022 (Click Here for the 2022 Homepage of www.censuremitch.com), RPK stepped in to stop the censure movement by ruling that such censures were "out of order".
If this effort gathers momentum, we expect they will step up at some point to defend McConnell against this petition. This will help us underline that the Republican Party of Kentucky is an organization run by McConnell loyalists. Once again, these people do NOT represent the majority of Kentucky Republicans. They have manipulated their way into leadership positions, and Republican voters need to understand the need for these people to be removed from leadership.