LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) - John Fox will vote for you if you love guns and want to outlaw abortion.
But in Kentucky’s razor-close Republican primary for governor, it’s not that simple. All of the candidates say they oppose abortion and all of them say they will not infringe on the rights of gun owners. So Fox, a 42-year-old security guard from Berea, is voting for Louisville businessman Matt Bevin. Not because he checks the right boxes, but because Bevin and his wife have adopted four children.
“His adoptions was a big thing for us,” Fox said. “If you read the Bible, it must say in there more than a dozen times that it is our responsibility to take care of widows and orphans.”
Kentucky’s Republican primary is too close to call just three days before the election. And with all of the major candidates agreeing on most every major issue - including ending the Common Core education standards and the state’s health insurance exchange - voters have to look elsewhere to find contrast.
“I think it does come down to where have you spent your life, what’s your background,” candidate Hal Heiner said.
With little room to attack each other on issues, the candidates have gone after each other’s character. Friday, Heiner released his first negative TV ad of the campaign based on allegations from Marilyn Thomas, James Comer’s college girlfriend who wrote in a letter to the Courier-Journal that Comer abused her.
Comer denies the allegations. And both he and Bevin have spent most of their time criticizing Heiner for negative campaigning they characterize as a reflection of his character.
Amid all the mudslinging, candidates have focused more on their backgrounds in making their closing arguments to voters in the campaign’s final days. In a race where the candidates appear to be in harmony on the issues, Tuesday’s winner very likely could be the one who tells the best story.
The race features two millionaires from Louisville: Bevin, an investment banker, and Heiner, a real estate developer. But both candidates have focused on their more humble beginnings in ads and when talking to voters.
Bevin was born in Colorado but grew up in northern New Hampshire. One of six children, he shared a room with his three brothers in a three-bedroom house that did not have central heating because he said his parents could not afford it. He hopes his story will resonate in a state that has the 7th most people living in poverty and includes the impoverished Appalachian region in the eastern part of the state.
“I am the only person in this race who grew up below the poverty level and there are a lot of people in this state who can appreciate that,” Bevin said.
Heiner was also one of six children. His father was an engineer, and while he said he received “some help,” he said he had to work a series of minimum wage jobs to get through engineering school.
“For those of you in my generation, if you could name a job that paid less than $2 an hour I probably worked it,” Heiner told the Elizabethtown Rotary Club this week. He said that list included dishwasher, bus boy, short order cook and janitor.
Bevin and Heiner have both run as “Frankfort outsiders,” focusing on their lack of experience in state government as evidence that they would bring a fresh perspective to what they view as a corrupt system. That’s a shot at candidate Comer, the state’s agriculture commissioner, who served 11 years in the state legislature.
In response, Comer has focused on his private business experience. He told the Jefferson County Republican Party on Thursday that he returned to his hometown of Tompkinsville after graduating from Western Kentucky University to start a business that is now one of the largest south central farming operations in the state. And he often mentions his stint as a director of South Central Bank.
“I have a business background, I have a legislative background,” he said. “I’ve already proven I can get more votes than (likely Democratic nominee) Jack Conway, that’s what I’m trying to do now.”
Comer was referring to the 2011 general election, where he received more than half a million votes for commissioner of agriculture while Conway, the likely Democratic nominee for governor, garnered more than 449,000 as attorney general. The two men have never faced each other in a head to head race.
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