Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Chairman Brad Lytle of the Wilson County Republican Party in-studio to describe the meet-and-greet that will take place in Lebanon on April 7th at 5:30 p.m.
Leahy: In-studio with us, good friend from upstate New York. Brad Lytle, the chairman of the Wilson County Republican Party. Brad, there is an event, I’ll be the emcee of this event, one week from tomorrow, Thursday, April 7th in Lebanon.
Tell us when and where, the details of the meet-and-greet. There will be 11 candidates, or 10 GOP candidates, who have announced they’re running for the 5th Congressional District in Tennessee. How many will be there?
Lytle: That situation is fluid, Michael. Right now it’s 11. It had been 12 and then it dropped to 10 and now it’s 11. So we’ll have 11 candidates there. We believe it’s on Thursday, April 7, we’ll have a meet-and-greet between 5:30 and 6:30.
And that’s where all those candidates will have a table with their election materials displayed, their yard signs, bumper stickers, et cetera, as well as our local candidates. I don’t know if you are aware of this, but this is really the first time that Wilson County has had partisan primaries.
Of the 50 positions that are opened locally, we have 66 Republican candidates running for those. There are 15 Independents.
And surprisingly, Michael, you might not believe this, but there’s only one Democrat running in Wilson County, and that’s for the Lebanon Specials School District.
Leahy: Well, there you go.
Lytle: There may be some Democrats running, but they’re not running as Democrats. And then the program will start at 6:30. And we have a great emcee.
Leahy: That would be yours truly, Michael Patrick Leahy!
Lytle: Yes, that’s correct.
Leahy: And all 11 of these candidates will be there. In essence, this is more going to be where I’ll introduce them, they’ll talk about their platform for about three minutes each, depending.
And that’s basically going to be just informational. It’s not going to be a debate or any of that. But 11 candidates, that’s a lot.
Lytle: That’s a lot.
Leahy: That’s a lot.
Lytle: It’s an exciting time for Tennessee-5, where myself and many of us are not really happy about losing our Congressman John Rose, because we were in the 6th district. But the chance to break up the Democratic stronghold in Davidson County is an exciting opportunity, with three different districts made out of that.
So we’re excited about that. And as you can see by the number of candidates, they are as well.
Leahy: Wilsoncountygop.com, that’s your website. Now, I understand that this is going to be pretty well attended. How many people have signed up for so far?
Lytle: Four hundred.
Leahy: Four hundred! Wow. This is going to be a big event. And so I guess all of the announced candidates will be there. Baxter Lee, Winstead, Natisha Brooks. I guess Andy Ogles, he’s planning on being here.
Lytle: He’s confirmed for being there, yes.
Leahy: Andy Ogles will be there, and then Robby Starbuck will be there.
Lytle: That’s correct.
Leahy: Morgan Ortagus. There’s one dropout, though, right?
Lytle: Yes. Well, I don’t know if he’s dropped out of the race.
Leahy: He’s dropped out of your event.
Lytle: And we were told that he’s dropping out of the race. Not dropping out, but going by what the Tennessee legislature has come through with the bill, and he’s going to abide by that. We were told by his campaign manager that he’s withdrawn.
Leahy: So this is David Vitalli.
Lytle: David Vitalli.
Leahy: But it’ll be interesting, and it’d be fun, and I’ll tell you what, if you’ve not ever been to one of these events – and I think this ought to be really anybody in the 5th Congressional District absolute who is a Republican who wants to learn, get to know these candidates –
Lytle: See them all at once.
Leahy: – see them all at once. You can go in. And I’m going to be there for the meet-and-greet before I emcee the event itself. But the meet-and-greet is going to be good because you walk in, the candidates have their tables.
They’ve got their campaign material. You get up, you can ask them questions, get to know what kind of people they are. I think that’s important, don’t you?
Lytle: Even though there’s going to be 400 people there, it’s going to give you an opportunity to go to that table, and maybe there’s a question you have for one of the candidates and you want to know, you would never get that opportunity in … a big setting, a rally or whatever. But this setting will allow that.
Leahy: And when you talk to somebody, you look at them face to face. You ask them a question. You see how they respond. You look eye to eye. You get a sense of who they are.
Lytle: Absolutely.
Leahy: And there are a lot of people. There are like 11 people. Maybe more. The filing deadline hasn’t happened yet.
Lytle: There’s one I couldn’t get a hold of, Richie Lee. I don’t know who that is. If you’re listening, Richie, contact me.
Leahy: Richie, this is your opportunity to make your case.
Listen to the full interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Sounds like it’s going to be a “carpetbagger’s” reunion!
Those that have been here for four years aren’t “Carpetbaggers”……. new law says so!