Phil Wadsworth pulls out a big win tonight in the Democratic runoff for Guilford County sheriff, besting CB Goins by a 12.4 percent margin. With turnout at 2.9 percent, the outcome had been tough to predict. In fact, Goins had led in early voting, with a tally of 440 to 339 -- a result perhaps of the fact that he spent several days campaigning in front of the early voting site at the Old County Courthouse. But the Wadsworth campaign had solid strategy for today's runoff. fielding enough volunteers to cover 15 polling places. Wadsworth said his campaign also targeted the voters who came out for the 2006 runoff with phone calls.
"We figured they were pretty dedicated voters," he said.
A retired State Trooper, Wadsworth had not been favored to win the May 4 primary, according to conventional wisdom and, frankly, the local media, including YES! Weekly. Based on the fact that he began his campaign last year and the prestige of his service in the US Marshal's Service, Harlon Costner was widely favored to lead the Democratic ticket, but he was eliminated in the primary.
"Y'all just looked at the cover, but didn't turn to the back pages," Wadsworth said. Predicting that he will turn out incumbent Republican BJ Barnes in the fall, Wadsworth and some of his supporters retorted, "It won't be a fluke." (They let it be known they were not wildly enthusiastic about a particular sentence in YES! Weekly's endorsement editorial last week.)
Wadsworth and his supporters groused that the news media failed to properly vet the two runoff candidates and the prevailing candidate said, "I'm the best qualified, I'm the only one qualified, and I've got the credentials to back it up."
A tired looking CB Goins sat by himself in the commissioners chambers at the Old County Courthouse, and by the time the final results were in he was gone.
"It's been a challenge," he said, reflecting on the campaign. "Win or lose, I thank Jesus Christ." His strategy, he said, was to "put it God's hands."
After the results came in, Wadsworth accepted the well wishes of Guilford County Commissioner Kay Cashion, the one prominent local politician who showed up at the Old County Courthouse to watch the results. Wadsworth took some calls on his cell phone, had his picture made with his volunteers, and began to pivot towards the general election.
"BJ has done a good job; I'm going to do better," he said. "A lot of citizens are ready for a change. I've had several people including Republicans call me and say they're going to vote for me because BJ said he wanted to get reelected to build the jail. I'm not trying to get elected to build the jail. I'm trying to get elected to make Guilford County a better place."
In the major statewide race, Elaine Marshall beat Cal Cunningham by a landslide for the Democratic nomination for US Senate, but Cunningham carried Guilford County by less than 200 votes. Cashion was happy to see Marshall win by such a decisive margin.
The state electoral map, which coded the counties carried by Cunningham in blue, showed a solid block of blue in the upper Piedmont from Alamance County in the east to Wilkes County in the west, and from Stokes County in the north down to Cunningham's native Davidson County in the south. The remainder of the counties, with the exception of New Hanover, went to Marshall.
"We're going to have to target those areas," Cashion said, noting that Democrats' challenges in the Triad are exacerbated by the fact that incumbent Republican Richard Burr is from Winston-Salem.
Earlier in the evening, Gary Palmer of Replacements Limited PAC -- which supports candidates friendly to gay and lesbian interests -- appeared at the courthouse. Palmer had been rooting for Cunningham, but said he would campaign for Marshall in the fall if she ended up leading the ticket and hoped other Cunningham supporters would also let bygones be bygones.
"The mudslinging hasn't been too bad," he said.
In other Guilford County runoffs, Bill Randall's decisive showing against Bernie Reeves in the Republican contest for North Carolina's 13th Congressional District roughly mirrored the statewide outcome, while Winston-Salem resident Scott Cumbie carried Guilford County in the Republican runoff for the 12th Congressional District but lost overall to Greg Dority of Washington, NC.
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