Tagged: Shane Schoeller

It took about 18 hours to tally the results, but Shane Schoeller (R, Willard) appears to have won the Republican primary for Missouri Secretary of State.

It was a close race the whole night, with fellow GOP contenders Scott Rupp (R, Wentzville) and Bill Stouffer (R, Napton) occasionally grabbing the lead – but in the end Schoeller came in first with 35.3 percent of the vote.  The Secretary of State's office confirmed the unofficial results shortly after 1:00 p.m. today.

“We sensed that we had the number of votes we needed, but we didn’t want to declare victory until the final results came in and we were confident that they would trend our way, and we’re just grateful that they did," Schoeller said.

Robin Carnahan’s decision to not seek a third term as Missouri Secretary of State has opened the door for seven hopefuls from four different political parties.  The contest had been relatively quiet until about two weeks ago, when the three Republican contenders began airing TV ads and stepping up their campaign appearances.  St. Louis Public Radio’s Marshall Griffin takes a look at the three GOP candidates who want to become Missouri’s next Secretary of State:

Updated 5:06 p.m. with comments from Mo. House Speaker Pro-tem Shane Schoeller and from Planned Parenthood.

Updated 12:38 p.m. with response from Archdiocese of St. Louis

Updated 11:58 a.m. with full remarks from Nixon.

Governor Jay Nixon (D) has vetoed a bill designed to thwart President Obama’s contraceptive mandate in Missouri.