A4 The BulleTin • Thursday, april 21, 2022
Missing man found dead
in submerged vehicle
Wallow County Chieftain staff
WALLOWA LAKE — A
26-year-old Enterprise man
was found dead in his vehi-
cle — which had been recov-
ered from Wallowa Lake —
on Friday.
The body of Devin Nel-
son Woempner-Velarde was
found in the passenger area
of a gold-colored 1999 Toy-
ota Camry, according to a
Wallowa County Sheriff’s
Office press release issued
Monday.
Woempner-Velarde —
and his vehicle — had been
missing since April 11.
A caller reported the ve-
hicle was in the lake at Wal-
lowa Lake State Park off the
boat ramp, the sheriff’s office
reported. The sheriff’s office
and Oregon State Police re-
sponded, and, with the help
of state park staff and an un-
Republicans
Continued from A1
The Dorchester Confer-
ence, held Friday through
Sunday, started 57 years ago
as a gathering of insurgent
liberal Republicans but has
changed with party politics
over the decades to reflect
the mostly conservative bent
of GOP activists.
Prior to the conference,
four candidates for the Re-
publican nomination for
governor will take part in a
debate in Bend on Thurs-
day that will be streamed
online at 7 p.m. Republican
candidates running for the
5th Congressional District
seat held by U.S. Rep. Kurt
Schrader, D-Canby, will par-
ticipate in a candidate fo-
rum on Thursday with the
City Club of Central Oregon
and the Deschutes County
League of Women Voters.
The debates will con-
tinue over the weekend at
the Dorchester Conference.
A larger pool of the more
than a dozen Republicans
running for governor will
debate, while another 5th
District faceoff will be held
between the two candidates
drawing the most financial
support in the race: Former
Happy Valley Mayor Lori
Chavez-DeRemer of Happy
Valley and Bend business-
man Jimmy Crumpacker.
A key difference in the de-
bates: The audiences at the
Dorchester Conference will
take a straw poll to pick a fa-
vorite candidate in both races.
While Republicans see
reason for hope in 2022, the
current reality is daunting.
Republicans now find
their voter registration num-
bers in third place, behind
nonaffiliated voters and
Democrats.
The party has not won a
race for governor since Vic
Atiyeh won a second term
in 1982. No Republican has
won a U.S. Senate seat since
Gordon Smith was reelected
in 2002.
Democrats in Oregon
have what political analysts
call a “triplex” — one party
has the offices of governor,
attorney general and sec-
retary of state. Democrats
also hold majorities in both
chambers of the Legislature
and the treasurer’s office.
Both U.S. senators and four
of five U.S. House members
are Democrats.
A new challenge for Re-
publicans is the emergence
of former Sen. Betsy John-
son, D-Scappoose, as a
nonaffiliated candidate for
governor. The daughter of
a former Republican state
lawmaker and mayor of Red-
mond, she’s staking out a
middle ground between the
two parties that she says have
become more extreme.
Whether Johnson will si-
phon more votes from Re-
publicans or Democrats is
up for debate, but in terms
of campaign contributions,
her largest donations have
come from Nike founder
Phil Knight and several tim-
ber, construction and man-
ufacturing firms that have
given mostly to Republicans
in the past.
One of the ongoing de-
derwater camera, found the
vehicle submerged roughly
40 feet from the boat ramp.
Wallowa County Sheriff
Joel Fish said Tuesday that
it appears Woempner-Ve-
larde drove off the ramp,
and likely before Friday. The
boat ramp was “covered with
snow” that was reported as
not having tracks in it when
the vehicle was located.
“The ignition was on and
the car was in drive,” Fish
said. “It looks like he drove
off.”
The sheriff added that the
cause of death, “appears to
be drowning, (but) the med-
ical examiner hasn’t finished
a death certificate yet.”
Fish said park rangers re-
ported seeing a gold-colored
car at the park April 11 or 12,
but were not certain if it was
Woempner-Velarde’s vehicle.
bates at the Republican con-
ference is whether the party
should broaden its appeal
to attract more voters or re-
main ideologically consistent
and hope voters will come
around to the party’s posi-
tions. Those tensions sur-
faced during the 2018 confer-
ence, when the late Secretary
of State Dennis Richardson,
the only GOP statewide of-
ficeholder, called for a “big
tent,” saying his 2016 upset
win was driven by voters
seeking good government,
not partisan affiliation.
“They wanted to elect
somebody who would keep
his promise to do that which
was best for our state,” Rich-
ardson said. “I said when I
was elected you wouldn’t be
able to tell if there was an ‘R’
or a ‘D’ behind my name, and
I hope that you can see that
I’ve tried to live up to that.”
But at the same event,
one of the key speakers was
Roger Stone, a political op-
erative for President Don-
ald Trump. He appeared at
the conference flanked by a
“bodyguard” of members of
The Proud Boys, a far-right
and at times physically ag-
gressive all-male organiza-
tion. Stone urged activists to
take up tools to get around
the institutions he said op-
posed Trump and conserva-
tive Republicans.
“The rise of a vibrant, ro-
bust alternative media, the
rise of social media, Twitter,
Facebook and so on, is what
allowed for the election of an
outsider candidate who the
mainstream media sought to
destroy,” Stone said.
Richardson died of brain
cancer in 2019. Trump par-
doned Stone of seven felony
charges in 2020. And more
than three dozen Proud Boys
have been indicted on charges
connected to the Jan. 6, 2021,
attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Along with Oregon politics,
the conference will include
a presentation on a possible
Chinese invasion of Taiwan,
while Steve Yates, national se-
curity adviser for former Vice
President Dick Cheney, will
talk about what went on “be-
hind the scenes” during and
after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz, R-On-
tario, will talk about Republi-
can plans in Congress, where
the party is hoping to take
back the majority in Novem-
ber. Panels will discuss natural
gas, dam removal and the po-
tential future of nuclear-gen-
erated energy.
Much of the draw for those
who attend are the smaller
receptions, lunches and
meetings held to network
throughout the weekend.
The conference has sched-
uled a golf tournament for
guests, weather permitting.
As soon as the Republi-
cans wrap up, it will be the
Democrats’ turn to party
with their party. The 11th
annual Oregon Summit of
the Democratic Party of
Oregon will be held at Sun-
river Resort from April 29
to May 1. It features Demo-
cratic Party versions of the
debates, panels, workshops
and network-building of the
Dorchester Conference held
before it.
█
gwarner@eomediagroup.com
source: esri
This map shows Oregon congressional districts approved in 2021 after redistricting.
Primary
Continued from A1
Though the state has just
2.9 million voters, Oregon’s
one U.S. Senate seat and six
U.S. House seats are part of
the electoral math both Re-
publicans and Democrats are
puzzling over in 2022.
Democrats hold a 221-209
majority in the House, with
five vacancies. The Senate is
split 50-50, with 35 seats up on
ballots around the nation.
The partisan split won’t be
known until after the Novem-
ber election. But new cam-
paign finance reports filed last
week show heavy spending by
candidates jockeying to carry
their party’s banner in the fall.
The Federal Elections Com-
mission released candidates’
financial reports covering the
first three months of 2022.
Much of the attention in
Oregon has gone to the free-
for-all race for the new 6th
Congressional District seat
centered around Salem. With
no incumbent in the race, 16
candidates have signed up to
run in the primary.
The race received national
attention last week with the
revelation that a Democratic
PAC tied to House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi had directed $1
million to Carrick Flynn, a po-
litical newcomer with ties to
cryptocurrency entrepreneurs.
The other Democratic can-
didates, who include two state
lawmakers, cried foul and
were joined by Sen. Jeff Merk-
ley, D-Oregon, in condemning
the unusual primary boost.
But an expected slam-dunk
U.S. Senate race and a pair of
scrambled congressional races
could play outsized roles in
deciding which party swings
the gavels when a new Con-
gress is sworn in next January.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden,
D-Oregon, was the most pro-
digious fundraiser, reporting
he’s received $11 million since
the beginning of 2021 for his
bid to win another six-year
term in the seat he’s held since
1996.
The five Republicans vy-
ing to run against Wyden in
November raised less than
$400,000 put together.
The Oregon election is
listed in major national fore-
casts as a “safe” Democratic
seat. But Wyden is taking no
chances, reporting he has over
$7 million in the bank.
When the new political
maps were approved in Sep-
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tember, both Democrats and
Republicans agreed that Dem-
ocrats were a prohibitive fa-
vorite in the 1st and 3rd U.S.
House districts, while Repub-
licans were a lock on the 2nd
District.
The financial reports reflect
those odds with donations pil-
ing up for incumbents.
U.S. Rep. Suzanne
Bonamici, D-Beaverton, re-
ported raising $605,435 be-
tween Jan. 1, 2021, and March
31, 2022. G. Scott Phillips, a
Democrat running in the May
primary has raised $20,944.
Republican Armidia Murray
did not have enough contri-
butions to be required to file
a report.
U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer,
D-Portland, reported raising
$795,393 over the same time
period. Republican Joanna
Harbour, who lost the 2020
election to Blumenauer, re-
ported raising no money so
far in 2022, but has $2,408 in
her campaign fund from pre-
vious time periods.
U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz, R-On-
tario, the state’s lone Repub-
lican in the delegation to
Washington, D.C., reported
$640,758 over the same 15
months. Democrat Joseph
Yetter received $10,312.
The highest stakes of the six
U.S. House races may be in the
5th Congressional District.
U.S. Rep. Kurt Schrader,
D-Canby, faces challenges
from the left and right in a
district that’s been radically
reconfigured by redistricting.
He’s seeking to return to Con-
gress in a district whose 2022
boundaries contain less than
half the registered voters of his
current seat.
The latest campaign fi-
nance reports show Schrader
has raised more than $1 mil-
lion in the past three months,
about twice as much as his
primary challenger, Jamie Mc-
Leod-Skinner of Terrebonne.
Schrader reported rais-
ing $713,641 from his main
campaign committee. The
FEC also reported Schrader
received $385,311 from in-
dependent expenditure com-
mittees, nearly all of it from a
group called Center Forward
Committee. It backs Schrader,
but he does not officially con-
trol its fundraising and spend-
ing.
Spending also rose sharply,
with Schrader reporting
$1,567,994 in expenditures.
He has $2,703,441 in the bank,
including money he raised in
2021.
McLeod-Skinner reported
raising $545,505 and spending
$235,395. She has $310,110 in
the bank.
While trailing in money,
McLeod-Skinner has touted
her string of endorsements
by Democratic activists frus-
trated by Schrader’s tepid
support and occasional op-
position to Biden’s legislative
agenda in Congress.
McLeod-Skinner has
drawn endorsements from
the Democratic Party com-
mittees in Deschutes, Clacka-
mas, Linn, and Marion coun-
ties, four of the five counties
that make up the district.
She’s also been endorsed by
the United Food and Com-
mercial Workers union that
represents 24,000 grocery
workers. The Oregon Educa-
tion Association, the union
representing 41,000 teachers,
endorsed McLeod-Skinner,
despite its parent organiza-
tion, the National Education
Association, giving Schrader
an A grade on his votes on
education legislation.
McLeod-Skinner’s cam-
paign put out an email after
the campaign finance reports
were released saying that more
funds were needed to make
up for the cancellation by
Schrader of a primary debate.
“Enthusiasm is continuing
to build around Jamie, but un-
fortunately, we fell short of our
mid-month fundraising goal
last Friday,” the message said.
The winner of the Dem-
ocratic primary will face the
victor of the Republican vote
on May 17. Bend businessman
Jimmy Crumpacker and for-
mer Happy Valley Mayor Lori
Chavez-DeRemer were the
top two fundraisers, according
to FEC reports.
Contributions to the two
were neck-and-neck, with
Crumpacker raising $467,195
since October of 2021, while
Chavez-DeRemer received
$455,930. But Chavez-
DeRemer has spent $247,415,
10 times more than the
$29,226 that Crumpacker
reported. Crumpacker had
$437,968 in the bank, while
DeRemer reported $208,515
in the bank.
A joint political action com-
mittee created to fund both
Chavez-DeRemer and 4th
District GOP candidate Alek
Skarlatos of Roseburg had
brought in only $1,800 since it
was created, according to FEC
reports.
Skarlatos lost a close 2020
race to U.S. Rep. Peter De-
Fazio, D-Springfield. He im-
mediately launched plans
for a rematch in 2022. He’s
raised $1,774,805 since the
beginning of 2021 and his lat-
est campaign finance report
showed he had $562,073 in
the bank at the end of March.
But there will be no re-
match. After the Oregon
Legislature approved a redis-
tricting plan that increased
the percentage of registered
Democrats in the district, De-
Fazio announced he was re-
tiring and later endorsed La-
bor Commissioner Val Hoyle,
who dropped her reelection
bid and filed to run for Con-
gress.
Hoyle’s report released
on Friday shows she’s raised
$626,325 and has $387,996 in
the bank. The money Hoyle
has left is more than twice the
amount in the bank of each of
the three other actively fund-
raising Democrats in the race:
engineering professor John
Selker of Corvallis, Airbnb
executive Andrew Kalloch of
Eugene and attorney Doyle
Canning of Eugene.
█
gwarner@eomediagroup.com