Secretary of State Robin Carnahan confirmed she will be running for a third term. (PoliticMo Photo/Blake James)
– Incumbent Secretary of State Robin Carnahan (D) , and State Senator Bill Stouffer (R) both confirmed Friday they will be running for Secretary of State in 2012.
Carnahan will be seeking her third term at the post, confirmed a spokesman to KMOX. Most recently she ran for U.S. Senate, where she lost to Republican Roy Blunt.
Carnahan has been Secretary of State since 2004.
Sen. Stouffer (R-Napton) announced his campaign Friday ahead of the Missouri GOP’s annual Lincoln Days.
He is currently sponsoring a constitutional amendment in the State Senate to require photo identification to vote in Missouri. In his statement, he spoke to the concerns surrounding around voter identity.
“Missouri has a rich history of competitive, close elections. Many in the last year were decided by a handful of votes,” he said in a statement. “But the current measures we take to verify the integrity of these elections are unacceptable.”
Carnahan has said she is against Voter ID requirements.
Most recently, Stouffer lost the GOP nomination for the fourth congressional district to Vicky Hartzler. From that race, Stouffer’s congressional committee still owes nearly $74,000 to Axiom Strategies, Jeff Roe’s firm.
Stouffer’s candidacy does not clear the GOP field. Republicans like Senator Scott Rupp (R- St. Charles) have also floated the idea of running.
The Carnahan campaign began revamping their website recently.
Team Carnahan has been quietly setting the stage for the reelect campaign for a weeks. Recently, they updated the inside of their website, replacing the “Robin Carnahan United States Senate” header with an updated “Secretary of State” header.
Her active Missouri Ethics Commission report shows more than $200,000 in the bank.
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