When veteran Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington, died last month, Vermont Democrats lost “a titan,” according to party executive director Jim Dandeneau.

Despite Sears’ death, he remains on the ballot for the August 13 Democratic primary election.

Given the state’s May 30 deadline for candidates to file petitions to get on the ballot, Dandeneau said, “We did not have an option.” Sears died just two days after the deadline passed.

“Vermont law does not have provisions for changes after the Primary Election filing deadline,” Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas said in a written statement.

The party does have a weeklong window to select a replacement candidate after the primary, she added.

A situation like this is incredibly rare, according to Democratic leadership.

“I can’t remember a circumstance where we had a candidate pass away after the deadline to file petitions, but before the election,” Dandeneau said.

The only way for candidates to enter a race after the May 30 deadline and before the primary is through a write-in campaign. But Dandeneau said he wasn’t sure it would be possible for such a campaign to succeed in this case.

“I think it’s very tough to run a write-in campaign of the scale that would be necessary to beat somebody whose name is on the ballot,” he said. “And,” he added, “who folks have been consistently voting for for decades.”

Other party members think it’s worth a try.

Rep. Seth Bongartz, D-Bennington, who had planned to run alongside Sears for a seat in the two-member Senate district, said he thought a win by a write-in candidate was entirely possible, albeit a “herculean task.”

Bongartz, who hails from Manchester, said that although he understood that Sears’ health was not at its best, “nobody knew” this would happen.

When Bongartz heard the news, he soon turned to the electoral implications. He reached out to Sen. Brian Campion, D-Bennington, a close friend and colleague of Sears’ who announced in May that he would not seek reelection to the district’s other Senate seat.

“Brian and I had no choice but to start looking for somebody to run in Dick’s place,” Bongartz said.

According to Bongartz, a vote for Sears as a form of homage to his legacy would actually be a slight against both the democratic process and the man himself.

“Dick believed in democracy,” he said, adding, “It makes no sense to vote for someone who can’t possibly serve.”