Former Vanderbilt University professor Carol Swain announced late Monday afternoon she is a candidate for Mayor of Nashville in the upcoming special election to name a new mayor to serve the balance of former Mayor Megan Barry’s term, which ends in August 2019.
In a statement, Swain said she “secured the necessary petition to become a candidate this morning, obtained more than the 25 signatures required to become an official candidate, and filed the petition this afternoon, which will qualify her to appear on the special election ballot.”
That date is currently set for August 2, but the Tennessee Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a legal challenge next Monday that could set the election date earlier, either on May 1 or May 26.
“The reason I’m running is that Nashville needs a choice between two different visions for the city. I believe the city is headed in the wrong direction, like many large cities headed by Democratic mayors,” Swain said in the statement, adding:
“Nashville is currently following the ‘tax-and-spend’ prescription that has resulted in so many of our cities becoming wastelands of poverty, crime, failing schools, and high taxes,” Swain noted in announcing her plans to run for Mayor. “We have a shrinking window of opportunity to avoid that future, but only if we act now to embrace new leadership committed to low taxes, common-sense regulations, and maximizing freedom and opportunity for all of our citizens.”
“This whole thing is about fixing potholes instead of building giant edifices while the city as a whole is not thriving. I’m concerned about the fact that if the transit plan passes, it’s not going to solve our problems and it will give Nashville the highest taxes in the country.”
“At a time when our school system mishandles $7 million, our city leadership promotes a $9 billion transit boondoggle that they admit won’t really relieve or reduce traffic congestion, seeks to embrace ‘sanctuary city status,’ and ignores the reality of crime and violence increasing across our city, we can’t afford to keep doing ‘business as usual’ with the ‘usual suspects’ running the show,” Swain said.
“I am delighted that Troy Brewer, an experienced and well respected C.P.A. who specialized in campaign finance and reporting, has agreed to serve as treasurer of my campaign,” Swain added.
Swain is making it clear that she opposes the proposed tax increase to fund the Megan Barry transit plan, a plan that has also been embraced by Mayor David Briley. “A bad idea didn’t get better simply due to Megan Barry resigning and Mayor Briley stepping in to replace her,” Swain pointed out. “I will be encouraging voters across the county to say “NO” to funding the transit plan in the May 1 Referendum. The first step to our retaking control of our city is to take control of our finances in the voter’s booth on May 1.”
Swain has an extensive record of academic success, as the bio included in her announcement statement indicates:
Dr. Carol M. Swain is an award-winning political scientist, a former professor of political science and professor of law at Vanderbilt University, and a lifetime member of the James Madison Society, an international community of scholars affiliated with the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. Before joining Vanderbilt in 1999, Dr. Swain was a tenured associate professor of politics and public policy at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Dr. Swain is passionate about empowering others to raise their voices in the public square. She is an author, public speaker, and political commentator.
Dr. Swain is the author or editor of nine books. Her first book, Black Faces, Black Interests: The Representation of African Americans in Congress (Harvard University Press, 1993, 1995), won the Woodrow Wilson prize for the best book published in the U. S. on government, politics or international affairs in 1994, and was cited by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in Johnson v. DeGrandy, 512 U.S. 997 (1994) and by Justice Sandra Day O’ Connor in Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. (2003). In addition, Cambridge University Press nominated her book, The New White Nationalism in America: Its Challenge to Integration, for a Pulitzer Prize. Her forthcoming book, Debating Immigration (2nd edition), is scheduled for a July 2018 release. Dr. Swain’s other books include Abduction: How Liberalism Steals the Hearts and Minds of Our Children (Christian Faith Publishing, 2016, co-author Steve Feazel), Be the People: A Call to Reclaim America’s Faith and Promise (Thomas Nelson Press, 2011), Debating Immigration (Cambridge University Press, 2007); Contemporary Voices of White Nationalism (Cambridge University Press, 2003, co-author Russ Nieli).
Dr. Swain’s opinion pieces have been published in CNN Online, The Financial Times, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Times, and USA Today. She has appeared on ABC Headline News, BBC Radio, NPR, INT News, CNN’s AC360, Fox News’ Hannity, Fox and Friends, Lou Dobbs Tonight, Judge Jeanine, The Story with Martha MacCallum, Michael Smerconish, The PBS News Hour, and The Washington Journal, and ABC’s Headline News. She had a major role in Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party and has had three Prager University videos go viral.
Her commentary on social and political issues can be heard nationally on Bott Radio and American Family Radio’s Two Minutes to Think About it. Dr. Swain received a B.A. from Roanoke College, M.A. from Virginia Polytechnic & State University, Ph.D. from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and M.S.L. from Yale. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee.
Swain is scheduled to appear on 99.7 FM WTN’s Nashville Morning News with Brian Wilson tomorrow (Tuesday morning) at 7:05 a.m. to discuss her candidacy.
Two other major candidates have announced they are running for Mayor of Nashville: Acting Mayor David Briley and Metro Council Member Erica Gilmore.
Thank God! Someone with some sense running!
She would make an Excellent President of The United States with The Way she Operates!!! The way she carries herself with The Utmost Integrity and doesn’t coward down to the opposing opinions of the left whose consciences are completely seared. So Thankful she has decided to Run and SHE WILL WIN!!! Rom 8:31
Carol Swain would be an awesome Mayor. I’m pulling for her. Terriffic intellectual.
Thank you, God! We finally have someone with integrity and this city’s best interest in the race. Professor Swain has a shot because we’ve just suffered from someone who was bereft of character.
Wow, imagine classy, smart, articulate Carol Swain versus that west coast ho, what a contrast! Nashville could be movin’ on up!
Address the issue of police interactions with the black community, joblessness, the schools that prompted white flight to surrounding counties.
We don’t need soccer teams. $80M minor league baseball or a host of liberal wishlist items. We don’t need $3M to get a Centennial Park train operational again.
We have a monopoly on music and live entertainment, a fantastic food scene, rising incomes and a bright future. Booming tourism and great people. Managed responsibly, the next 25 years could be amazing if the corrupt staus quo could be boxed out.
New Orleans without the public urination.
Fix traffic and crime, lower taxes and revitalize this city. Expand drug courts. Drop the hammer on these nightly shootings.
Good times don’t last forever. Responsible growth can see us through the ups and downs of the next 30 years.
John: Agreed. Ideology and vision are important and there is considerable overlap between the two.
Bristol is likely more moderate but both suffer from the retail, babykissing, gladhanding, Sunday morning speechifying along with a lack of organization needed to galvanize a majority under short circumstances.
An outsider could make an impact but it is a fight against an entrenched establishment here.
Divide their interests. The black community does not trust the police. The police are lickspittle minions to the unions and party establishment while violent crimes spirals out of control.
Not to mention the spending spree, tax moratoriums on new businesses and infrastructure that theatens our vision.
They have to play the reasonable moderate card and capture the disenfranchised base of those ignored by the white progrssivism that has a stranglehold on true progress in this city. Black and lower to middle class alike.
There is an opportunity but time constraints to reach the thoughtleaders in those communities is a major hindrance considering both have no support network or fundraising apparatus.
Win Daron Hall. Fracture Gentry, Fuzz, Walker plantation that reliably supports the immoral. Provide businesses with an EVerify golden bridge. An economic Free Trade Zone. Reduce the Davidson Co tax burden. Target schools and incentivize teachers a stake in improving them.
The current schools director needs a one way ticket back to Bodymore, Murderland. Whoever watched The Wire and wanted to replicate that here needs a lobotomy so there is a fracture between the teachers and the administration.
Capitalizing on these in a short time frame is almost impossible.
Someone please explain to me why, at the very last moment, TWO conservative (in an electoral jurisdiction where political conservatives are probably a minority to begin with) candidates—Carol Swain and Ralph Bristol–will now run against each other and ‘split’ the conservative vote between them and maybe thereby ‘throw’ the mayoral election to the liberals (and who have an electoral advantage to begin with) who want to spend the City of Nashville into oblivion (and eventually maybe the State of Tennessee itself when everything goes bad, and Metro Nashville then NEEDS a financial ‘bailout’ from the State to save itself from financial disaster)? CAN’T BRISTOL AND SWAIN GET TOGETHER AND DECIDE BETWEEN THEMSELVES WHICH ONE SHOULD STEP ASIDE IN THIS RACE?
Ralph Bristol left conservatism when he went “pro gas tax” in the face of a $2 billion surplus in the State coffers. Responsible conservatives would have advocated for a plan to more handsomely fund infrastructure and rainy day funds with the surplus, before asking taxpayers to dig in their pockets once again. Many of them did, but they had a radio talk show personality shooting them in the foot. They are addicted to YOUR money and Ralph enabled it. In my mind, his credentials were tarnished. Dr. Swain, on the other hand, is known for not falling for liberal mindset. Ralph could do us all a favor and pull out of the race on his own. Dr. Swain has the RIGHT stuff!
Way to go, Dr. Swain. Thanks for showing up and showing out tand “being the change you want to see in the world”!
Excellent! The GOP peed in their wheaties in RINO Alexander’s last senate bid. The GOP ran SEVEN candidates in the primary. If you total the votes for the seven, Alexander could have been defeated. GOP incompetence/stupidity starts at the state level and only gets worse nationally!
As far as a conservative being elected mayor of Nashville, dream on! The last Republican mayor was 1888, 130 years ago.
It’s called the “splitter strategy.” It’s how RINOs get elected over and over again. They attempted to hand over the Presidential Republican Primaries to !Jeb! by using this.
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2015/12/18/tripwire-alert-the-splitter-strategy-now-evolves-to-focus-on-alliances/
We need to start coalescing around our candidates early in the race to eliminate this. Alexander will be up for reelection in 2020. We need to decide on our challenger NOW, not at the last minute.