from Brandon Jarvis

The Petersburg Democratic Committee plans to vote on removing a member after a video posted on social media sparked controversy.

The committee plans to vote on firing Pat Hines, the Petersburg NAACP president, for creating a video in support of Belinda Baugh, an independent candidate for City Council.

This is the first year that Petersburg will hold partisan elections for City Council seats while remaining nonpartisan for school board elections.

Petersburg leans heavily Democratic. According to VPAP, about 85% of the city voted for Terry McAuliffe, the Democratic candidate for governor, in the 2021 election.

Hines describes herself as a “lifelong, proud, party-card Democrat” who refused to kneel before a candidate she never supported. She says Baugh is her longtime friend and a “lifelong Democratic voter” who failed to file for a primary in time, forcing her to run as an independent.

The video in question is a film Hines created on Facebook earlier this summer. The video urges people to vote for Baugh, who is running for the District 2 seat against incumbent Darrin Hill.

Hill is the only candidate in Petersburg who registered as a Democrat in all districts in this year’s election.

“So apparently my contribution is considered ‘public support against a Democrat under the rules set forth in the charter,'” Hines said in a written statement. “If I am asked if I would (so to speak) get on my knees and show my support – I would not lie just to keep a position with the Democrats as precinct chair.”

Hines says she had no intention of damaging Hill’s candidacy by posting the video on Facebook.

“I explained that I had no intention of making a video for my friend. It was not a recommendation, nor was it intended to be malicious or political, nor was it an attempt to harm the Democratic candidate.”

The committee had planned to vote on Hines’ removal on Thursday, but because a candidate forum is taking place, the vote will take place at a later date to be announced.

Janell Sinclair, chair of the Petersburg Democratic Committee, says she has been harassed in this regard and provided a detailed written explanation of why the committee is taking this action.

“Anyone can be a Democrat. But there is a difference between being a Democrat and being an official or member of a Democratic committee,” Sinclair said in a written statement. “As a member/official, we voluntarily agree to abide by the written rules.”

In her statement, Sinclair cited rules from the Virginia Democratic Party’s State Party Plan.

“In accordance with the Petersburg Democratic Committee’s Bylaws (Section 3.4 – Removal), we will comply with the Virginia Democratic Party’s State Party Plan (established in 2015 and revised in 2018), Section 10.8 – Party Support,” she wrote. “The first line of this section states: No Democratic committee member or officer of a Democratic committee shall publicly SUPPORT, ENDORSE, OR AID a candidate opposed to a Democratic candidate.”

The Democratic Party of Virginia did not respond to comment for this article.

Sinclair says committee members were informed of this rule earlier this year when Petersburg switched to partisan elections and that no member should be exempt.

Hines responded directly to Sinclair’s statement on social media.

“First, no one is bullying you or the other two members who choose to follow the rules (without adequately considering the 2024 changes),” she wrote. “The issue here is that choosing to join the committee by declaring support for Democratic candidates is not usually an issue until this year — when only one council candidate gave his endorsement. My violation of the rules was not opposition to her opponent, the Democrat. Neither I nor many others on the committee considered it public support. And I definitely did not know that by being on the committee, I would be bound to someone I never supported!”

Barb Rudolph, a political observer in Petersburg who runs the Facebook group Clean Sweep Petersburg, says candidates seem hesitant to agree to the new requirement to disclose their party affiliation, since only one candidate has done so.

“Of the six candidates running for City Council this year, at least five have known ties to the Democratic Party,” Rudolph said. “The fact that only one received the party label suggests that our local candidates generally oppose this new top-down requirement.”

She also pointed out that this incident creates a divide between people who normally pursue the same goals.

“The controversy is unfortunate in that it can pit people who share the same or similar goals against each other,” she said. “And this incident is a bit like ‘slamming the barn door after the horse has escaped.'”

In 2023, Petersburg Mayor Sam Parham, long believed to be a Democrat, was featured on a campaign flyer for Republican Rep. Kim Taylor in her re-election campaign. He has also developed a close relationship with Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican.

Parham was not pushed out of the Democratic Committee at the time, but resigned from his membership last November after the committee pointed out that he had violated its bylaws.

“You just get tired of having to explain yourself every time there’s a photo with someone. Just because I take a photo next to a giraffe, does that make me a giraffe?” Parham said in a statement to the Richmond Times-Dispatch at the time.

“People — including independents like myself — were surprised when Mayor Parham, who was considered a Democrat, declared his support for the incumbent Republican delegate last year, as evidenced by his appearance on her campaign mailer,” Rudolph said. “He survived that insult from the local party committee — and his ‘offense’ seemed more egregious than what Ms. Hines displayed in a campaign for elected positions that had no partisan designation for many years.”

Hines does not deny that she broke the rules, but had hoped that she would be given some leniency, which she did not intend to do.

“I had hoped that the violation or infringement would be viewed as an inadvertent error that I was unaware of or viewed as support or public endorsement. I understand rules and regulations and do my best to follow them.”