Barely a peep

Primaries coming; candidates not drawing much attention

Pity the candidates trying to gin up interest in this year’s primary elections. The Arkansas preferential primaries, slated for May 22, are less than two months away and sneaking up on us.

The candidates in contested primaries have been making the rounds of speaking engagements and any public gatherings where they may interact with potential voters. But this election cycle is surprisingly quiet so far.

Before it is over, look for congressional races and maybe a statewide race or two to heat up a bit.

Congressional races should prove more interesting than the rest.

Arkansas, a solidly “red state” these days, may not be totally immune from the “blue wave” that threatens to upset the current balance of power in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Still, it is likely that most, if not all, of Arkansas’ Republican congressmen will retain their seats. They all do have opponents, including some in their own party primaries.

Purposely, the candidates are identified here only by their names, the offices they seek and their party affiliation, if any. Consider it a test to see if voters are at all ready for the May 22 vote.

Most voters probably won’t recognize any but the incumbents, which underscores the advantage of incumbency in any year, not just this one.

Try as they may, this roster of mostly unknown challengers has little time to get themselves known.

Nevertheless, there are a bevy of candidates this year, especially for Congress.

Arkansas’ 1st District congressman, U.S. Rep. Rick Crawford, will escape a primary election. The Republican has drawn challenges from Democrat Chintan Desai and Libertarian Elvis Presley.

All three other Arkansas congressmen similarly picked up general election opposition, although only two face primaries.

U.S. Rep. French Hill is the other Republican without a primary challenger. But he will face one of four Democrats squaring off in the primary for the 2nd Congressional District nomination — Gwen Combs, Jonathan Dunkley, Paul Spencer and Clarke Tucker.

The November general election will be among Hill, the eventual Democratic nominee and Libertarian Joe Ryne Swafford.

The 3rd District’s incumbent, U.S. Rep. Steve Womack, drew a Republican primary challenger in Robb Ryerse.

Four more challengers for the 3rd District seat await in the general election — Democrat Josh Mahony, Libertarian Michael Kalagias, independent Josh Moody and write-in Jason Tate.

In the state’s 4th District, U.S. Rep. Bruce Westerman has a Republican challenger in Randy Caldwell. The nominee will face Democrat Hayden Catherine Shamel, Libertarian Tom Canada, independents Jack Foster and Lee McQueen and write-in Susan Ann Martin in November.

That’s a total of 22 candidates for the four congressional seats. Most of them probably aren’t that well known, even in their respective districts.

Expect the most activity to come from the 2nd District and its four-person Democratic primary.

At the state level, there will be precious few primary contests, although two of them may get noisy.

One is Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s bid for re-election, which is being challenged by fellow Republican, Jan Morgan.

Democrats will also see a gubernatorial primary between challengers Jared Henderson and Leticia Sanders. Libertarian Mark West will await the Republican and Democratic nominees in the general election.

Morgan is the candidate making noise in the Republican primary, but she isn’t likely to upset Hutchinson, who is especially popular among the state’s Republicans.

The other statewide race that will get voter attention is for a nonpartisan associate justice seat on the Arkansas Supreme Court. That election will be held in conjunction with both the Republican and Democratic primaries on May 22.

Incumbent Justice Courtney Goodson drew opposition from Kenneth Hixson and David Sterling.

As was the case in the last Supreme Court elections, expect strong donor influence in this race and its eventual outcome.

There will be only one other Republican primary for statewide office. The secretary of state’s office drew candidacies by Republicans Trevor Drown and John Thurston. The nominee will face Democrat Susan Inman and Libertarian Christopher Olson in November.

The secretary of state’s office is one of two in which there is no incumbent candidate. The other is land commissioner. The current officeholders in each were term-limited.

The remainder of the statewide offices won’t be on the ballot until November, when there will be Republicans and Libertarians and sometimes Democrats seeking the offices.

For the record, here are the general election matchups:

Lieutenant governor — Republican Tim Griffin, the incumbent; Democrat Anthony Bland; Libertarian Frank Gilbert.

Attorney general — Republican Leslie Rutledge, the incumbent; Democrat Mike Lee; Libertarian Kerry Hicks.

Land commissioner — Republican Tommy Land, Democrat T.J. Campbell; Libertarian Larry Williams.

Auditor — Republican Andrea Lea, the incumbent; Libertarian David Dinwiddie.

Treasurer — Republican Dennis Milligan, the incumbent; Libertarian Ashley Ewald.

That’s it for statewide candidates and for this year’s unusually active congressional races.

Maybe someone among them will awaken the electorate’s interest, but this is so far a slowly unfolding primary season in Arkansas.