Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Gave Extensively To Republicans

By Kleinheider Posted on February 23, 2009 at 8:09 am

It would appear that the Tennessee Democratic Party’s new treasurer is not the only Democrat of note with a history of contributing money to both Democratic and Republican causes.

Post Politics has learned that Ward Cammack, one of two Democrats actively campaigning to succeed Governor Phil Bredesen in 2010, has given to a myriad of Tennessee Republican candidates starting in 1979 with a donation to Senator Howard Baker’s 1980 Presidential run.

While Cammack has supported Congressman Jim Cooper with financial donations steadily throughout his career, a large majority of his donations have gone to Tennessee Republican candidates for federal office. In 1994, the year of the Republican Revolution, Cammack gave extensively to both Bill Frist and Fred Thompson who were victorious in grabbing both of Tennessee’s U.S. Senate seats that year.

Cammack also gave heavily to Lamar Alexander contributing to both his Presidential run in 1996 as well as his initial 2002 Senate run. In 2008, Cammack gave heavily to Alexander’s opponent Bob Tuke.

Cammack’s most recent Republican donation was in late 2005 when he contributed $500 to Bob Corker’s 2006 Senate primary campaign though Cammack tells Post Politics he ultimately voted for Corker’s opponent Harold Ford, Jr.

In discussing his party shift, Cammack cannot point to any “Road to Damacus” moment but admits that he is “clearly a convert” to the Democratic cause and credits the Bush years for his shift in worldview.

“Everything has changed. A lot of things people thought they had to protect, be it money or a set of so-called moral beliefs, have proved illusory,” Cammack explains. “All we really have is each other.”

Cammack, whose first Democratic vote for President was cast last fall for Barack Obama, said it was the exclusionary tactics of the GOP which led him to begin to question the staunch Republicanism he had learned as a child.

“Eventually you just have to ask: What is this all about? Why are we marginalizing people like this?” Cammack explains.

When asked whether he could pinpoint whether it was Republican policies on social issues, economic issues or foreign policy that ultimate let to his conversion, Cammack was unequivocal.

“All of the above,” replied Cammack.

Cammack does expect that some may be skeptical of his political past but insists that the Democratic Party is a “very comfortable skin for him.”

“Yes, I have given [money] to Republicans in the past and I have voted for Republicans in the past. I have never tried to hide that,” Cammack says. “But if you ask me if I believe in the Democratic Party, the answer is yes. Yes, I do.”

SEE ALSO: The Rotunda asks: “[I]s there a prominent Democrat expanding the tent of the party to reach the affluent white guys like Ward Cammack and Bill Freeman?”

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Tags: 2010 Governor's race, 2010 Gubernatorial Election, Bill Frist, Bob Corker, Bob Tuke, campaign contributions, campaign finance, Fred Thompson, Harold Ford, Howard Baker, Jim Cooper, Lamar Alexander, Ward Cammack  

Mike Faulk’s Campaign Fianace Director

By Kleinheider Posted on August 1, 2008 at 7:33 am

Angelia is quite upset that Republican candidate for the 4th District state Senate seat of Mike Williams, Mike Faulk, beat her to the punch by revealing his daughter’s role in his campaign:

This allowed him to get the news out before someone else could give it a spin, which annoyed me. Really, really annoyed me.

In fact, I’ve been mad about it the whole week long.

See, I had already gone through the trouble of downloading Faulk’s campaign finance reports, bought a new calculator to add things up and spent time surfing around the Arkansas Secretary of State website, so I could post about how Faulk gives himself a reimbursement for mileage to rival that of a longhaul trucker, how he’d paid his daughter’s Arkansas corporation, KLF AND COMPANY, almost 10k in consulting fees (well, if you deduct her $1000 donation to dear ol’ dad, technically it would be less) and how some of the names on Faulk’s campaign donor report are people whom, I suspect, are still wearing their “I Heart the State Income Tax” t-shirts.

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Tags: 4th District, campaign finance, David Oatney, Marsha Blackburn, Mike Faulk, Mike Williams, mileage reimbursement, Ron Ramsey