Tag: Hickory County

MAGA v. Extra Super MAGA in SWMo

Now that Former Guy has picked his running mate, you’ll be seeing even more Missouri Republican candidates promoting their Christian Nationalist (gift article) credentials.

In the 128th District, Polk and southern Hickory Counties, cattle country, home and birthplace to Governor Mike Parson, one Republican got a head start as a Christian Nationalist candidate. Derral Reynolds has campaign yard signs and a YouTube commercial using the Christian symbol of a cross. The commercial also misspells foreign.

The Bolivar retiree wants voters to “Invest in the future of you and your family’s security by sending strong Christian Conservative values to Jefferson City… Take Missouri Back for us” per his campaign website. “Take Back America” is a popular theme for the Former Guy campaign. MAGA Republicans run Missouri, hold every statewide office, have a majority in both chambers of Legislature. For Missouri Republicans, this election season is a battle between MAGA and Extra Super MAGA.

The scariest statement on Reynold’s website: “It is time for the good Christian people of this country to step up and set things right. We need America to be “One Nation Under God” again.”

Per Press Release, Reynolds campaign talks about “illegal immigration” and “school choice.” “Illegal immigration – it affects your wallet, costing Missourians over $446 million last year. They bring drugs, sex trafficking and crime into our cities, violence and gangs to our schools.” “School choice will hold public schools accountable. Derral wants to move public money to pay for your kid’s private school. There are many problems in our schools he will address.”

Reynolds has loaned himself a total of $7,842.23 so far and not reported any monetary contributions. He and his family appear to be running his campaign. He’ll come in third is my guess.

The four-man GOP primary for 128th District comes down to the Battle of Mayors.

Chris Warwick, current Bolivar Mayor and electrical biz owner, has the usual MAGA agenda: “Upholding the Constitution, Supporting Family Farms & Businesses, Increasing Parents’ Rights in Education, Advancing the Pro-Life Cause, Promoting Local Control.” Local control is a bit of a joke when it comes to Missouri GOP. No MAGA Republican wants St. Louis and Kansas City to have local control.

Warwick raised $6,279.70, mostly local contributions, since converting his mayoral committee to Missouri House race. Pro-charter schools Quality Schools Coalition donated $2000 to his campaign.

Per Press Release, Warwick hired Jeff Roe’s Axiom Strategies. His campaign finance reports do not show any money paid to them to date.

The leading candidate is probably Dr. John Best, cardiologist, former Bolivar mayor. He loaned his campaign $50,000, donated another $5,225, has $42,464.21 on hand.

Best does not have a campaign website. He has a Facebook page but I don’t use Facebook and don’t encourage others to use it either. This press release provides no insight on where he stands on issues.

Best did a mailing to Hickory County voters for a meet and greet event last month at Pomme de Ritas, a bar with food at Pomme de Terre Lake. His campaign finance report lists an expense of $448.38 to Pomme de Ritas for “advertising.” A MAGA neighbor attended as was impressed by Best’s opposition to “illegal immigrants.”

In 2017 and 2018 (paywall) Best was the subject of sexual harassment complaints.

Victory Enterprises is running Best’s campaign. Protect the Harvest is another of their clients. That’s one of millionaire (half a billion) Forrest Lucas‘s pet projects. Lucas is the largest landowner in Hickory County, home to Lucas Cattle Company. He was under consideration for Interior Secretary during Former Guy’s term and responsible for two pardons by Former Guy in 2018. His wife said the quiet part out loud about minority populations in 2014.

Bill Yarberry, a Fair Play cattleman, is a perennial candidate for state representative and state senator who has loaned his campaign $3,300 and not received any contributions. He came in third place in 2022 in a three candidate GOP primary for Senate 28th District in which incumbent State Senator Sandy Crawford, the only Republican Senator with a primary challenger, held the seat with 63.7%. I don’t see a website for him but here’s a candidate bio from his 2016 campaign.

Yes. There’s a Democrat- Rich Horton, Brighton. He was Democratic Party nominee for 128th District in 2018 and 2022. He sold his electric service shop in Springfield last year. Horton donated $500 to his campaign and has $209.73 on hand. He has no website.

Mo Dem Party Blows Off 27 Rural Counties

Missouri Democratic Party Map of Election Polling Places

The Missouri Democratic Party’s party-only funded and managed Presidential Preference Primary took an odd turn recently when the Party posted its March 23rd Election Polling Places to their website. There’s a map of locations and an alphabetical list with addresses, oddly broken into four sets.

Missouri has 115 counties: 114 regular counties plus St. Louis City, a city and its own county.

Votes may be cast in person at a polling place in the voter's county of residence from 8:00a.m. to 12:00 p.m. on the date of the primary. Each county will have a polling place and the St. Louis and Kansas City metropolitan areas will have multiple polling places.

Per State Party’s Delegate Selection Plan, each county will have at least one polling place. It turns out, however, that MDP failed to secure polling places for 27 counties with small populations in rural Missouri. These include:

Audrain
Atchison
Bates
Bollinger
Caldwell
Chariton
Clark
DeKalb
Harrison
Henry
Hickory
Holt
Knox
Lewis
Mercer
Mississippi
Monroe
New Madrid
Nodaway
Ozark
Pemiscot
Putnam
Ralls
Randolph
Reynolds
Schuyler
Scotland
Stone
Sullivan

MDP hired Merriman River Group to run the election but I don’t know who is to blame here given the dumpster fire that State Party has been for a very, very, very long time.

Is it possible that Missouri Democrats are still working on finding polling places. Sure. They have to be accessible, smoke free, available that Saturday morning, and probably have reliable internet/cell signal, a hard thing to find in small population rural counties in Missouri.

But that’s not what is going in here. According to Missourinet, “Most Missouri counties will have one polling place each, though some rural counties won’t have any in-person voting places.”

The only option for voters in 27 Missouri counties to vote in the Missouri Democratic Party Presidential Preference Primary is a) drive to the nearest county that has a polling place or b) vote by mail-in ballot. Deadline to request a mail-in ballot is Tuesday, March 12th.

I don’t know about the other counties, but there’s been no notice about this party-managed election in the weekly paper in Hickory County, The Index.

Someone paid for an ad in Thye Index, without “Paid for by,” for the Republican Caucus a couple of weeks before the March 2nd event. It was buried with legal notices for small town RFPs. People are still griping about not knowing about the Caucus and blaming it on unnamed RINO’s and, of course, Democrats. Imagine a facepalm emoji here.

This was a bad idea from the start. Democrats could have gone with a Caucus system. But Rusty Carnahan et al at MDP wanted Ranked Choice dark money to pay for the election but Democratic National Committee said no. See previous blog post on how this all started.

Blowing off 27 counties is just the latest in Missouri Democrats not getting it.

President Joe Biden

Please Vote for the re-election of President Joe Biden on November 5th (or earlier if you have the opportunity) and get your friends and family to vote… for democracy’s sake.