THE Trumpet of Patriots candidate for the electorate of Flinders, Jason Smart, has announced he is “withdrawing his candidacy” for the upcoming federal election after being “blind sided by Clive Palmer’s decision” to preference Climate 200 backed candidate Ben Smith.
The announcement came on Monday (21 April) after he was unable to resolve the preferencing issue with Trumpet of Patriots head office.
The preferences “crisis” came after One Nation’s Mike Brown and Smart had originally announced on 16 April they would stand as a “unified alliance”.
Accordingly, Smart stated his intention to place Brown second on the Trumpet of Patriots ticket, and Brown announced he would place Smart second on the One Nation ticket.
Those plans were thrown into disarray when news came down from Trumpet of Patriots head office last Friday (18 April) that they had decided Smart’s second preference would go to Smith.
While Smart has announced his “withdrawal”, he is unable to be removed from the ballot at this late stage. He also told The News it is against AEC rules for him to create a how-to-vote card inconsistent with the once produced by Trumpet of Patriots head office. Smart believes his only option is to ask voters to “put him last”.
“My wife and I have been sitting here at home in utter disbelief since Friday morning”, said Smart.
“I was given an undertaking by Clive Palmer and the Trumpet of Patriots that if I ran as a candidate for them, that the Teal/Labor/Greens candidates would be last on the how-to-vote card.”
“I only agreed to run on that basis.
“If Clive Palmer thinks I’m going to put my love for my country to the side so he can try and gain some political relevance, he’s dead wrong,” said Smart.
“I’m nobody’s chump.”
The decision by Trumpet of Patriots head office left One Nation’s Brown scrambling to reprint 25,000 how-to-vote cards that had preferenced Smart, before early voting begins Tuesday (22 April).
Smart told The News he had met with Brown, and that moving forward, he would be assisting Brown with his campaign. Brown has now preferenced Liberal Zoe McKenzie second.
The Smith campaign told The News they had never communicated with Trumpet of Patriots head office, or Smart, and were not aware that Smith was preferenced second until the how-to-vote cards were published.
