2037 Morranian Vice Presidential Election

The **2037 Morranian Vice Presidential Election** was held between Monday August 3rd and Friday August 7th, 2037 and was the first intra-term vice presidential election to be held in the Republic of Morra, as well as the first executive level election to be held by the National Assembly of Morra.

Following the impeachment of Vice President Eris Assecla on July 28, 2037 in the aftermath of the Derigo disease debate, the office of vice president immediately became vacant, automatically beginning the constitutional process to fill the position. As such, on July 29, 2037, Speaker Frank Wassenberg announced in a press conference that an election for the vice presidency would be held by the National Assembly in a series of ballots beginning on August 3rd. On August 1, PvdA party leader Wilhelm De Croo, LPM leader Marine Le Pen, and DENK leader Johannes de Klerk all formally announced their candidacies for the vice presidency, whilst the governing VVD failed to agree on a single candidate, leading to the unusual situation of the party running two candidates, education secretary Kairos Hemlock and defence secretary Lammert van Raan. Amidst internal unrest within the governing VVD-APA-NP coalition, the Worker's Political Alliance declined to run a candidate, whilst New Party leader Didier Reynders announced his candidacy in an attempt to divert votes away from van Raan, with whom Reynders shared a personal feud with.

In order to qualify for the first ballot, candidates had to secure the nominations of 20 members of the National Assembly, and had to meet all requirements to hold the office of vice president. Following the first ballot, any candidate who received fewer than 35 votes would be eliminated, alongside the lowest ranked 30% of candidates. After the second round of voting, any candidate receiving fewer than 75 votes would be ineligible to continue to the third round, as would the bottom ranked half of candidates on the second ballot. If no candidate secured a majority in the third round, then a fourth ballot would be held; for the fourth round, new candidates would be allowed to appear on the ballot as long as they had the nominations of 100 members of the Assembly. Further rounds of balloting would be scheduled until only two candidates remained, with a certain proportion of candidates eliminated each round. In the case that no candidate in the head-to-head ballot secured 151 or more votes, runoff votes would be held. The speaker of the National Assembly may also opt to re-start the balloting process with a whole new slate of candidates.

Following the first round on August 3, 2037, Didier Reynders and Johannes de Klerk were eliminated from the ballot, having failed to secure the required 30 votes to take part in the second ballot. After the second ballot, Marine Le Pen was eliminated after failing to secure 75 votes, whilst Lammert van Raan withdrew midway through the ballot after only securing the backing of four members of the Assembly, following a campaign led by finance secretary Fachnan Opus' to rally the VVD behind education secretary Kairos Hemlock. In the final round, Hemlock successfully managed to secure the backing of the APA and won the ballot by 171-129, defeating opposition leader Wilhelm De Croo. Following the final vote, Hemlock had her oath of office administered by Speaker Frank Wassenberg in the National Assembly chamber, and was formally inaugurated as vice president of the Republic of Morra on August 7, 2037.