H. Brooke Paige wins five or six GOP nomination slots in Vermont.

Paige won the Republican nomination to run against Bernie Sanders for the Senate race. But that’s only one of the many races Paige was victorious in Tuesday night. He’s also going to be a Republican candidate in one of Vermont’s  congressional districts, the Republican candidate for auditor in Vermont, the Republican candidate for attorney general in Vermont, and the Republican candidate for secretary of state in Vermont. Finally, although voting is tight, as of Tuesday night he was also on track to be the Republican candidate for treasurer.

How did Paige end up with five or six Republican nominations? Will he really run for all those post? What will happen if he wins more than one? 

The answer to these questions is complicated and has to do with Paige wanting to protect Vermont’s small Republican Party from being taken over by Democrats. As Vermont Public Radio explains:

“As you may be aware, for a number of years the Democrats have been crossing over in the primary and taking advantage of the fact that the Republican Party did not have candidates for all the slots in the primary,” Paige explained Friday on Vermont Edition.

“About 800 to 900 and sometimes a few more Democrats would religiously grab Republican ballots and write in the published candidates from their Democratic primary ballot. Obviously, with no other candidates running, there was no concerted effort on the part of the Republicans to fill the slots in the primary.”

If there’s a vacancy on the primary ballot, the Republican Party in Vermont is then allowed to nominate a someone by petition to run for that office in the general election.

It’s Paige’s hope that by representing Republicans in every race, Democrats will not be able to write-in a candidate in the August primary, and should Paige choose to bow out, his party can select a candidate to run for the position in the November general election.