(RoyalPatriot.com )- Former Congressman Scott Taylor’s staff has been getting in a lot of trouble since he failed to win re-election back in 2018.
This week, another high-ranking member of his team was convicted of all election fraud charges levied against him.
Robert Catron, who was serving as a top consultant for the 2018 re-election campaign for Taylor, earlier in December pleaded no contest to the charges, which were reduced significantly in a plea agreement with prosecutors. The case relates to the GOP staffers forging signatures of local Virginia voters so they could get a Democrat candidate placed on the ballot as an independent.
A grand jury in Virginia Beach originally indicted him on 10 counts of election fraud and making false statements, charges that could’ve seen him spend 100 years in jail. Despite those serious charges, Catron’s legal team struck a plea deal with prosecutors, with the charges being finalized as misdemeanors.
The plea agreement saw Catron plead no contest to three misdemeanor charges labeled as neglect of election duty. As a result, Catron received a sentence of 36 months, which is suspended and will be dependent on his good behavior. He’ll then spend one year on probation and be fined $7,500.
Catron’s conviction is now the fourth time that a member of the re-election campaign of Taylor in 2018 has been convicted for their roles in the election fraud. Other staffers who pled guilty to the charges against them are Heather Guillot, Roberta Marciano and Lauren Peabody.
The staffers allegedly tried to get Shaun Brown, a Democrat who beat Taylor for his Congress seat in 2016, on the Virginia ballot as an independent. The National File reported they did so in order to try to split the Democratic vote, which they believed would propel Taylor to victory.
Seniors members of Taylor’s campaign, as well as Taylor himself, instructed these campaign staffers to collect ballot signatures on behalf of Brown, court documents laid out. Their efforts failed, though, as Taylor lost in the general election.
His defeat came as he couldn’t garner enough support from conservative voters, who apparently didn’t like the fact that he didn’t support LGBT priorities.
Taylor himself has never been charged or convicted in the case, and prosecutors say the case is closed now. That being said, he has admitted that he knew of the scheme and participated in it, though it isn’t clear whether he actually broke any laws.
After the sentencing for Taylor was handed down, Jarome Bell — one of Taylor’s former opponents — shared his thoughts about the situation with National File. He said:
“In my honest opinion, there is no way that Scott Taylor didn’t know about what was going on. I find that very hard to believe. People that worked on his campaign were getting signatures for a third party and he didn’t ask questions?
“Being an ex-Navy SEAL and an ex-Congressman, Scott Taylor should be capable of paying enough attention to detail to avoid something like this within his own campaign. It’s no wonder that he lost not once, but twice, to Elaine Luria.”
