Why Southerners Are Nominating No-Name Candidates

The truck driver who won the Democratic nomination for Mississippi governor -- without spending a cent -- is the latest candidate who lacks any political experience. How are they winning over voters?

Everyone knows Democrats are struggling in the South. Sometimes, they can't even nominate serious candidates for office.

In August, Robert Gray, a truck driver by trade who spent zero dollars on the race, won the Democratic nomination for governor of Mississippi. Gray hadn't even bothered informing his mother, who lives with him, that he was running. He also didn't bother voting for himself.

Gray's situation may sound unusual, but something like it actually seems to occur just about every election cycle. There are plenty of nominations barely worth pursuing around the country in low-profile races against formidable incumbents. But in the South, neither the press nor voters pay much attention to many Democratic primary races, making the region particularly fertile ground for political unknowns to win statewide nominations.

"This is a symptom of a larger problem with Democrats in the South," said Brent Leatherwood, executive director of the Tennessee Republican Party.

In Texas, where Democrats haven't won a statewide race in more than 20 years, the 2014 nomination for agriculture commissioner went to Jim Hogan, a cattle farmer who, like Gray, spent no money on his own race but beat the party's candidate of choice. Hogan told me at the time that he believed he had a good name and voters did seem to prefer it to that of his lead opponent, who was listed on the ballot as Hugh Asa Fitzsimons III. Hogan also bested singer and perennial candidate Kinky Friedman.

For years, a man named Gene Kelly -- not the star of old movie musicals -- forced Texas Democrats into runoffs, despite not actively campaigning.

In a race that few care about, a familiar-sounding name might be enough to win. In Mississippi, Democrats say that Gray's position as the first name on the ballot had a lot to do with his victory. He was also the only man in a three-person field.

"The thread they all have in common is a weak Democratic party and underfunded statewide candidates," said Mark Jones, a political scientist at Rice University. "The result is [that] a majority of the people voting in the Democratic primary don't know anything about the candidates other than what is presented on the ballot, and that is their names."

But unknown candidates haven't been vetted by party leaders or the media.

Alvin Greene, an unemployed military veteran, became an embarrassment after he won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in South Carolina back in 2010. The day after his victory, the press revealed that Greene was facing obscenity charges.

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