Scott Ashjian

Jon Scott Ashjian (born 1964), commonly known as Scott Ashjian, was the candidate of the Tea Party of Nevada in the race for United States Senate in the 2010 Nevada general election. Ashjian was born in Fresno, California; the oldest of eight children. After graduating from South Lake Tahoe High School in 1982, he started his own auto detailing company in Bakersfield, California, and grew it to include locations in Fresno, Bakersfield, and Visalia, California. He is a Mormon, and served on a mission in Argentina from 1986 to 1988. Ashjian moved from California to Nevada in 1995. He resides in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he works as a businessman, paving contractor, and real estate investor, and is owner of an asphalt company. With his wife, Bonnie, he has two sons and one daughter.

Ashjian was a member of the Republican Party, and voted for the presidential candidacies of Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and John McCain. In 2010, Ashjian and his supporters created the Tea Party of Nevada, whose values espouse small government, freedom, liberty, and decreasing the United States public debt. Ashjian filed his candidacy papers for the Tea Party, a registered minor party in Nevada, at Carson City on March 2, 2010. Ashjian's U.S. Senate candidacy was challenged in court in April 2010, and Carson City, Nevada district judge James Todd Russell ruled that he could stay on the ballot. This decision was appealed, and the Nevada Supreme Court ruled in a unanimous decision on October 6, 2010, that Ashjian would remain on the November 2010 ballot for U.S. Senate. His grandfather, John M. Ashjian, worked in law enforcement and was appointed by the Board of County Supervisors of Bakersfield, California as Chief Probation Officer. Ashjian and his wife have two sons and a daughter. He is involved with California based agricultural ventures. Ashjian's candidacy is the only one which appears as the "Tea Party" on the November 2010 ballot. Ashjian's supporters created the party, by successfully filing more than the 250 signatures needed. The Tea Party of Nevada's stated goals include striving to "promote this nation's founding principles of freedom, liberty and a small representative government." The American Independent Party, which brought the suit against Ashjian, Ashjian commented on attempts to remove him from the ballot, "They are doing the bidding for the Republican Party. They should welcome the ability of minor parties to field candidates when the two major political parties have failed us so badly." On October 6, 2010, the Nevada Supreme Court issued a unanimous ruling that Ashjian's candidacy would remain on the November 2010 ballot.

Describing his political views, Ashjian stated to the Las Vegas Review-Journal that he espouses Tea Party views including limiting the role of government, and a strict interpretation of the United States Constitution. He explained that he filed to run for U.S. Senate, because individuals in Nevada who identified with Tea Party values had been "duped by the Republican Party". The candidate served as his own communications director, and relied on his family and friends for assistance.

Ashjian stated in an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, "I'm a frustrated patriot. I'm not a politician. I'm not savvy with radio and TV. But I believe I can make a change, and that's what I'm here for. I'm here to give people a third choice."

In October 2010, Ashjian released a tape to the media of a recorded conversation he had with Sharron Angle where she asked him to drop out of the race. Ashjian commented about the meeting, in an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, "She asked that I support her, and I said, 'Why would I go and do that?'". He emphasized that he would not drop out of the race, "I call the shots. ... I fought too hard to be on the ballot to get off." Ashjian sent a letter to Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller in October 2010, asking that party abbreviations on ballots be removed.

On October 28, 2010, a second ruling by the Nevada Supreme Court again affirmed Ashjian's ability to stand as a candidate in the 2010 Nevada election for U.S. Senate. In the case, the office of the Secretary of State of Nevada had asserted that the effort to appeal the case to the Nevada Supreme Court was without merit, because voters had already received absentee ballots and a removal of the candidate's entry would have the impact of therefore disenfranchising voters. In its unanimous decision, the Nevada Supreme Court ruled, "(The) appellant's unexplained delay in prosecuting this appeal militates against disrupting the election process, which is already underway." One day before the U.S. Senate election, Ashjian received three percent in a survey from Public Policy Polling. Harry Reid won the race, and was reelected to the U.S. Senate.