CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Just how unpopular is President Barack Obama in some parts of the country? Enough that a man in prison in Texas got 4 out of 10 votes in West Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary.
The inmate, Keith Judd, is serving time at the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana, Texas, for making threats at the University of New Mexico in 1999. Obama received 59 percent of the vote to Judd’s 41 percent.
For some West Virginia Democrats, simply running against Obama is enough to get Judd votes.
“I voted against Obama,” said Ronnie Brown, a 43-year-old electrician from Cross Lanes who called himself a conservative Democrat. “I don’t like him. He didn’t carry the state before and I’m not going to let him carry it again.”
When asked which presidential candidate he voted for, Brown said, “That guy out of Texas.”
Judd got on the state ballot by paying a $2,500 fee and filing a form known as a notarized certification of announcement, said Jake Glance, a spokesman for the Secretary of State’s office.
Attracting at least 15 percent of the vote would normally qualify a candidate for a delegate to the Democratic National Convention. But state Democratic Party Executive Director Derek Scarbro said no one has filed to be a delegate for Judd. The state party also believes that Judd has failed to file paperwork required of presidential candidates, but officials continue to research the matter, Scarbro said.
Voters in other conservative states showed their displeasure with Obama in Democratic primaries last March.
In Oklahoma, anti-abortion protester Randall Terry got 18 percent of the primary vote. A lawyer from Tennessee, John Wolfe, pulled nearly 18,000 votes in the Louisiana primary. In Alabama, 18 percent of Democratic voters chose “uncommitted” in the primary rather than vote for Obama.
Obama’s energy policies and the Environmental Protection Agency’s handling of mining-related permits have incurred the wrath of West Virginia’s coal industry. With the state the nation’s second-biggest producer of this fossil fuel, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin and Sen. Joe Manchin —both Democrats have championed the industry — have declined to say whether they will support Obama in November.
Hillary Rodham Clinton beat Obama handily in the state’s 2008 primary, and he lost the state to Republican John McCain in the general election. The latest state-by-state Gallup poll, released in January, found Obama with a 32.7 percent approval rating in West Virginia. The president had a lower approval rating only in Utah, Idaho, Oklahoma and Wyoming.
“Keith Judd’s performance is embarrassing for Obama and our great state,” outgoing West Virginia GOP Chairman Mike Stuart said.
Presumed Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney won West Virginia’s GOP primary Tuesday with more than 69 percent of the vote, with 93 percent of precincts reporting. Rick Santorum followed with 12 percent, while Ron Paul had 11 percent.
Brown, the Cross Lanes electrician, went to the polls with his 22-year-old daughter, Emily. She planned to vote for Judd, too, until she found out where he has been living.
“I’m not voting for somebody who’s in prison,” she said.
She was certain about one thing: “I just want to vote against Barack Obama.”
Hillarious…..Should be an interesting Nov……
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This is more riveting than the GOP convention. Democrats; be afraid !
With all of 5 electoral votes, it’s unlikely the President will be having any sleepless nights over West Virginia.
Ridiculous. If you’re voting for an inmate over Obama, your motivation is nothing but blind hatred.
Hatred?? Really? So you think 40% of WV Democrats who went to the polls are all haters?
That kind of dismissal of people’s honest discontent with this President is why the Democrats are losing ground.
Haters ? hmmmm, I think the revolt is due to the Obama green anti-coal attitude. WV is a coal state. This may be grass-roots reactions to a failed Presidency.
even the Dems. in WV are bigots would be my guess.
Having spent time with people form W.Va. in the service and had one as a co-driver when I used to drive truck over the road. The one universal thing I have found is that they were all rabidly racists. I never could figure it out. It must be a cultural thing.
There is nothing honest about choosing an inmate over Obama. Get real.
Can I just point out to the Ron Paul supporters that even in a two-person primary race, Ron Paul still came in third behind a man not even running any more. Tell me how that is a conspiracy against Ron Paul, and not just the honest rendering of the American public’s support of Ron Paul?
The motivation is “anyone but Obama” and is simply a protest vote.
A prison inmate would indeed do a better job than the current infestation in Washington.
I hate to tell you this, West Virginia, but this really isn’t doing anything to dispel the stereotype of West Virginians as inbred, racist backwoods outcasts from society. I know you folks did this to mock President Obama, but it’s you everyone’s laughing at.