[LPIL - Board of Directors] Fwd: Political Division

Wed Nov 23 20:22:47 EST 2022

I will gladly vote to approve Jake; his help and expertise was greatly missed this past election cycle. 

Kelly Liebmann

Greenwood Township Trustee
Selective Services Region 1 Board Member
Deputy Voter Registrar
Treasurer, McHenry County Libertarians
LPIL IT Operations Director
Greenwood 3 Libertarian Party Precinct Committeeman

"It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government." -Thomas Paine

> On Nov 23, 2022, at 6:31 PM, Blake Hanson via Lpil-bod <lpil-bod at lists.lpillinois.org> wrote:
> 
> 
> Forward of Jake Leonard's email.
> 
> ---
> Regards,
> ~Blake Hanson
> ~Director, Field Operations Division
> ~Libertarian Party of Illinois
> ~Cell: (779) 777-5139
> ~Business Email: fieldopsdirector at lpillinois.org
> ~Personal Email: blake.a.hanson1 at gmail.com
> 
> 
> 
> -------- Original Message --------
> 
> Subject:	Political Division
> Date:	2022-11-10 17:32
> From:	<chairman at tricountylibertarians.org>
> To:	<chair at lpillinois.org>, <vicechair at lpillinois.org>, <secretary at lpillinois.org>, <treasurer at lpillinois.org>
> Cc:	<executivedirector at lpillinois.org>, <communications at lpillinois.org>, <fieldopsdirector at lpillinois.org>, <it at lpillinois.org>, <scc1 at lpillinois.org>, <scc3 at lpillinois.org>, <scc5 at lpillinois.org>, <scc6 at lpillinois.org>, <scc7 at lpillinois.org>, <scc9 at lpillinois.org>, <scc10 at lpillinois.org>, <scc11 at lpillinois.org>, <scc15 at lpillinois.org>, <scc16 at lpillinois.org>, <scc17 at lpillinois.org>
> 
> 
> All,
> 
>  
> 
> Any email that I send to this party is never easy. My resignation as Political Director in May in wake of the aftermath of the national convention in Reno was one of the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make in my nine years in the party, six of which were in active involvement in the Political Division under the divisional administration leadership of Scott Schluter and Kyle Symons.
> 
>  
> 
> Early Wednesday morning, almost 2 a.m. if I recall correctly, Executive Director Justin Tucker and SCC District 9 representative Adam Balling, posed a question as to whether I would ever return to lead the Political Division, which the director role has been vacant since May.
> 
>  
> 
> I am aware that I upset some of my long-time allies within this party. I also angered people who were either adversaries (mainly because of some stupid, irrelevant caucus affiliation) or allies who became enemies because of that resignation email.
> 
>  
> 
> I felt a lot of anger and frustration over Reno that I (wrongly) assumed the worst for Illinois, hence what I call my rash decision to resign from all roles with the party, not only as Political Director, but from the national ballot access committee. I dissolved my chapter and didn’t even reconstitute as ChrisMont (meaning Christian and Montgomery counties) Libertarian Central Committee until a week or so before the election.
> 
>  
> 
> Amidst all that, I may have been dealing with several bouts of burnout, given that most of my time in charge of the Political Division was often. It would have been nice to have a deputy director to cover some slack in alternating months.
> 
>  
> 
> I know I’m capable of continuing the work I did and fulfill some objectives that I wasn’t quite able to enact. One of the initiatives I wanted to do was allocate candidate recruitment directors based on state region. Chicago/Cook County could very easily be its own recruitment region (and easily subdivided as necessary), given that in 2024, they will also be able to circulate petitions for all Congressional and General Assembly districts exclusively within its borders.
> 
>  
> 
> But I know that this is not what you want to know. You want to know if I’m capable of keeping my temperament in check. I know it won’t be easy, but I’m sure as hell going to try.
> 
>  
> 
> At this point, I’m just ready to bury the hatchets and let bygones be bygones. Especially given the circumstances of Tuesday night, being that the Libertarian Party is officially established in my home county in Montgomery County as a result of Attorney General candidate Dan Robin getting 5.29%. That brings the number of established counties to eight, the third to be established as a result of a statewide candidate after McLean County (Gary Johnson, POTUS, 2016) and Kankakee County (Mike Leheney, 2018, State Treasurer).
> 
>  
> 
> Should this board opt to reappoint me to the role of Political Director, I’ll be too busy planning for 2024 to even be bothered by factional infighting.
> 
> Cook County has a plethora of races, which will include county-exclusive Congressional and General Assembly races. Their ballot access is good until 2026, and I only expect that to extend even longer. There was a great slate of candidates that we fought tooth and nail for in Federal court this cycle. Their rockstar candidate this cycle was most definitely Niko Tsatsoulis, who earned 200,000 votes in a head-to-head race against a Democratic incumbent for the office of county assessor.
> Similarly, McLean County has also extended their status to 2026 earning nearly 24% combined between results from McLean County and the Bloomington Election Commission.
> We have work to go to retain our major party status in DeWitt, Kankakee, McHenry, Peoria, and Tazewell counties. Four counties didn’t run any countywide candidates this cycle, while we didn’t quite get 5% in McHenry. It will be of utmost importance to slate candidates in 2024 to retain such status.
> Then, of course, we have Montgomery County to plan for. Every single election has gone uncontested by Republicans (and Democrat for county treasurer for as long as I’ve lived here.
>  
> 
> But if this board opts not to, I’ll understand and respect your wishes. That will just give me a clear message to just focus on Montgomery County for the 2024 and 2026 general elections, and the partisan township elections in 2025.
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you for your time.
> 
> Jake Leonard
> Interim Chairman and Montgomery County Chairman | ChrisMont Libertarian Central Committee
> Immediate Past Political Director (Nov. 2019-May 2022) | Libertarian Party of Illinois
> 800 Capps Ave., Nokomis, IL 62075
> Website: www.tricountylibertarians.org
> work – Heartland Newsfeed: 217.569.4230 x700   |   mobile: 217.565.9273  |   mobile: 217.565.9709
> 
>  
> 
> 
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