Election Results, Good, Bad, and Ugly
(note from editor: In anticipation of the outcry from hog farmers, we should point out that generally a hog will stop eating once it is full.)
The emails that we received after the primary election were mixed as were the results for the election itself. Some thought that the conservative cause was slaughtered, others were not sure what to think. Our view is that the election was a success for the most part.
The governor's race wasn't pretty at all, three RINO candidates, Cornett, Stitt, and Lamb, all placed higher than any single conservative. The three conservative candidates, Gary Richardson, Gary Jones, and Dan Fisher brought up the tail among the serious candidates.
Basically anyone standing on principles and wanting to cut waste out of the government sank like a stone. The more conservative the message the lower the percentage of votes, in all, only 18% of the people voted for any one of the three conservative candidates. The number of votes cast was huge, over the amount cast in the 2016 Presidential election.
Todd Lamb was no doubt surprised to not get in the run off. His volunteers and campaign staff was shocked too, to the point the Lamb campaign signs are still littering the streets and by ways. Stitt was probably shocked. Cornett no doubt felt entitled to be there. The run off between Cornett and Stitt will likely put Stitt into office as Lamb and Cornett were the two sides of the donor class and they might not come together. Stitt had more of a statewide appeal while Cornett did well mainly in central Oklahoma.
The state question 788 passed, weed will now become legal for those with a doctor's permission to get a license. The vote pulled in around 40,000 voters who voted only for the state question, apparent both in the numbers in the results and from reports from poll workers who said many asked for the pot ballot and fed the main ballot into the machine blank. Immediately the news broke that those with a weed license would lose the right to keep firearms due to federal law. Negotiations with the pot referendum backers and the House and Senate leadership first focused on a special session but later Fallin refused to order a special session claiming that the state health department can handle the temporary rules till the legislature gets back to work in February. A lot of questions that had been brushed aside such as the effect that having a weed license might have on things like child custody, employment issues, security clearances, so the legislature will have a host of things to clear up.
The special session was nixed mainly because Fallin was afraid the legislature would overturn some of her vetos at the end of the session and because any weakening of the weed statutes by the legislature would have driven a lot of these new voters back to the polls to retaliate against anyone that voted for the weakening of the law. And that would be mainly the establishment/donor class owned politicians.
In the Lt. Governor race Dana Murphy came out on top but a runoff with the notorious Made in China Matt Pinell is needed. The AG office will have another runoff between Hunter and Drumond, neither is a good choice in our opinion. The state auditor was also split and a runoff between the top candidate Cyndi Bird and Charlie Prater is needed. State Superintendent of Schools was also put into a runoff between incumbent RINO Joy Hoffmeister and conservative Linda Murphy. Costello got the most votes in the labor commissioner race but RINO legislator Leslie Osborn will face Costello in the August primary vote. RINO Glen Mulberry outright won the Insurance Commissioner slot, the only race won outright. The corporation commissioner race put incumbent Bob Anthony against Brian Bingman.
In the state senate the biggest upset was the notorious RINO Ervin Yen getting trounced 63 to 37. This was one of the races that received the Oklahoma Guardian voter guide and the anti forced vaccination group had invested heavily in walking the district.
In the House races we lost one good man, Chuck Strohm. Bobby Cleveland, a RINO at heart but one that would do the right thing if his butt was whipped politically on a regular basis wound up in a primary race and might well lose his seat. Greg Babinec, one of the RINO stooges in that infamous picture during that special session vote that turned down the massive tax increase bill, lost outright 61 to 29%, an enormous butt whipping. Steve Vaughan of district 37 was defeated by Ken Lutrell58 to 42. In HD 38 incumbent RINO John Pfieffer was forced into a runoff against conservative Brian Hobbs, 43 to 31%, another of our voter guide races. RINO Scooter Park was defeated 18 to 52%. Over in HD 101 Tess Teague barely survived and is facing a runoff 38 to 37%. Teague had voted against the taxes in the special session but she slipped back to her old ways in the main session and paid a price for doing so.
Of the five districts that we had voter guides delivered in, three were pretty much wins and two were losses. McCall and Josh West faced poorly funded challengers so the voter guide was too little too late to affect the outcome. But the Yen, Pfeiffer, and McDugle issues were solid wins. The latter two do face runoff/challenges but when you have a poorly funded challenger force the incumbent into a runoff it is a win. Yen of course was badly whipped outright.
The McDugle race was the best testament as to the power of a voter guide going out into a district. McDugle had managed to get his opponent fired from his sheriff deputy job in Wagoner County thanks to Sheriff Elliot being a close personal friend of McDugle. In order to land another job the opponent had to suspend his campaign in the last three weeks but lost by only five votes after the provisional ballots were counted. And the voter guide missed one of the three largest towns in the district due to manpower shortage, the city of Wagoner never learned about McDugle's voting record. The challenger had to cancel the last round of mailers, post that he was dropping out of the race, stopping all door knocking, and stopping all campaign sign posting. Despite all of this the Sooner Tea Party stepped in with the voter guide and a few Facebook videos sent out into those zip codes. All pure voter education on the voting record of McDugle and some of his personal disgraces that were already well known, no endorsement for the challenger, no need to tell people to vote against McDugle. And dirt bag McDugle finds himself nearly losing.
In our opinion the primary was generally a success. The donor class lost many. We lost one. We have most of the state wide offices going to a run off. We have two of the RINOs, Pfieffer and McDugle, in either runoffs or court challenges that might push the election to be redone. Many of the conservative legislators survived the primary and are in runoffs where we will have a good chance of saving some of them.
