STEVEN ALLEN ADAMS, PARKERSBURG NEWS AND SENTINEL
W.Va – WV Can’t Wait, which united several Democrats, Republicans, Mountain Party members, libertarians and independents, saw more than 43 of its candidates win races on June 9, running on a populist platform to take on the good old boys and lobbyists.
Victories include electing Rosemary Ketchum as the first transgender woman on the Wheeling City Council, re-nominating Morgantown Delegate Danielle Walker as one of five incumbents for the 51st District, a woman of color who received more votes in her race for a second term in the House of Delegates than any other House candidate in both parties, and sending six teachers on to November…
The WV Can’t Wait coalition included candidates for federal, state and local candidates. It included candidates for county commissions, magistrate courts, school boards, mayors and councils, the Legislature, the Board of Public Works and Congress.
Every WV Can’t Wait candidate for the U.S. Senate and House of Representative made it through, including Paula Jean Swearengin challenging incumbent Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va.; Natalie Cline for 1st Congressional District to challenge incumbent Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va.; and Cathy Kunkel in the 2nd Congressional District to challenge incumbent U.S. Rep. Alex Mooney, R-W.Va.
In the 3rd Congressional District, both Democrats Hilary Turner and Lacy Watson were WV Can’t Wait candidates. Turner, who will face Rep. Carol Miller, R-W.Va., narrowly won the Democratic primary against Watson by 67 votes. Swearengin, Cline, Kunkel and Turner are an all-woman slate of congressional candidates.
“Not only that, every single one of us won our races without taking a dime of corporate PAC money,” Swearengin said in a statement. “We are 100-percent people-funded.”
All of the WV Can’t Wait candidates signed pledges to never take corporate political action committee campaign donations.
“We can’t continue electing leaders whose whole goal is getting paid to do the bidding of the same corporate lobbyists who flood our mountains with drugs and death in exchange for money,” Swearengin said…
