It’s a big day for me. I know now that I’ll have at least one vote for me in the primary. In the Democratic Presidential primary, I had been toying with the idea of voting next week so that I could see the outcome of the Nevada caucus before I chose someone here in Tennessee. Instead, I voted with my heart for President. If you care to hear about my vote in that race, I did a short post here.

I have to admit that I paused a second when I got to the point where I was voting for myself. We’ve got a long way to go in this campaign and I’m probably a pretty big underdog in the general against whichever Republican wins on March 3. And, yeah, I get to vote for myself at least one more time (August 6, 2020, in case you were wondering). But this was the first time my name has been on a ballot like this. It was satisfying. And frightening. And exhilarating. I’m glad I’m on this ride. And I’m thankful to all of the people who have supported me to this point and who will be supporting me for the next 5 months. Thank you.

I also wanted to point out one thing I noticed. I’m in Precinct 69E. The races on the ballot for me were: President; County Commission, District 4 (my race); Criminal Court Judge; Public Defender; Assessor of Property; and County Law Director. The only Democrats I could vote for were for President and me. This is one of the reasons I’m in this race. Even if I turn out to be the worst candidate in Knox County history (hopefully I’m better than that), at least the voters of District 4 have someone to vote for. On the other hand, if you chose the Republican ballot, you didn’t have much choice for President, but you had two candidates running in each of the other races. And now, in the August election, while the Commission race will be contested, the rest of those local races are mostly uncontested (there’s an independent running in the Law Director race).

Voters deserve a choice!