I knew when I entered this race that I would not be the good-ole-boys’ preferred candidate.
I knew it wouldn’t be an easy fight because I wasn’t next in line.
The fact is, I hadn’t spent years positioning myself for the moment when the right people would decide it was my turn. I didn’t wait for a phone call, a blessing, or permission from the establishment.
I knew I would be stepping out of line.
But I ran anyway.
You see, there is a certain way politics is supposed to work. You keep your head down. You make the right friends. You take the right pictures. You wait your turn. And when the people who have controlled the process for years decide you are ready, they open the door.
That has never been me.
I don’t have the political machine behind me. I don’t have a scrapbook full of pictures with Roger Wicker, Michael Watson, Trent Lott, and other long-in-the-tooth politicians who have been in office for decades.
I don’t have the Southaven mayor’s endorsement or a collection of other politicians telling voters that I am the approved choice.
If that is what you are looking for in a Circuit Judge, I am not your candidate.
I have seen this movie before.
I work for a District Attorney who didn’t come from the political establishment’s preferred line of succession either. Many of the people who opposed him then, and who still oppose him now, are familiar names, who oppose me, too.
So when many of those same political circles began lining up in this race, I wasn’t surprised.
The establishment has a long memory when someone refuses to wait his turn.
So do I.
I am the candidate who put my name on the ballot without asking permission from the people who believe they get to decide who moves up the ladder and who waits.
I guess that makes me the underdog.
And I’m comfortable with that.
There is a difference between being chosen by the political establishment and being chosen by the people.
There is a difference between being next in line and earning the job.
I owe nothing to the establishment. I want nothing from it.
I am running because I believe my experience in Circuit Court, my tough-on-crime record as a prosecutor, and the work I have done for the people of DeSoto County have earned me the right to ask for their vote.
I am the only candidate who has prosecuted child predators, drug traffickers, and violent criminals, and stood before juries and handled the kind of serious cases that come through Circuit Court. I am the only candidate who has experience at the District Attorney's Office.
And I am the only one in this race that has been in Circuit Court doing the work this job requires.
Not because someone said it was my turn.
Not because a group of politicians decided I was their guy.
And not because I waited patiently for permission.
Maybe that is not how the establishment thinks these things are supposed to work.
But fortunately, they don’t get the final say.
Voters do.
