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A Final Preview of Saturday's Republican Convention

This weekend, Republicans will be holding a multi-location convention to select their statewide nominees.

For months, Republicans were bitterly divided about what process they should use to select candidates for statewide office. The one they eventually decided on has never been done before. I'll take place at more than three dozen polling locations across Virginia.

Conservative analyst Matt Colt Hall.

"Ballots will be transported by an RPV courier to the convention site, and they will get there by the best means possible," he says. "I know that the polling location on Tangier Island is going to have to come by either seaplane or boat because it is an island in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay."

When all those ballots finally arrive in Richmond, Republicans will be doing some serious math. Jurisdictions that have a history of voting Republican will be weighted more, and then there are the ranked-choice ballots, which means the candidates with the most initial votes might not end up winning.

David Ramadan at George Mason University's Schar School says a lack of trust in election integrity will influence every step in the process.

"And that's why they are hand counting the ballots," explains Ramadan. "No computer supposedly is trusted and no software company is ever trusted now in the Republican circles to count ballots. And that's why we’re not going to see results until probably Tuesday or Wednesday."

After winners are finally announced, candidates who don’t trust the outcome will have enough time to file as independent candidates and challenge Republican nominees this fall.

This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.

Michael Pope is an author and journalist who lives in Old Town Alexandria.