Republican candidates make campaign stop Monday in Bardstown

By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio

Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2015, 10 a.m. — With 42 days left before the Nov. 3 election, candidates for the state’s constitutional offices are on the road,, meeting voters as they make the case for their desire to hold elective office.

FOR MORE: Visit the Nelson County Gazette’s Facebook page for more photos from Monday’s event.

Jenean Hampton said her running mate, Matt Bevin, represents Kentucky’s best chance to send a true entrpreneur to Frankfort.

Jenean Hampton and Allison Ball, the two Republican women running for state office, visited Bardstown Monday evening and asked voters to look beyond the 30-second political ads and examine the qualifications and motivation of the candidates in each race.

Hampton, a candidate for lieutenant governor and Matt Bevin’s running mate, told listeners of her childhood growing up in Detroit as the daughter of divorced parents. “My sisters and I should have ended up as statistics after my parents divorced,” she said. She and her sisters beat the odds and wound up as the first generation of her family to graduate from college.

For Hampton, one motivation to escape the inner city was knowing that the U.S. Constitution applied to everyone. “I knew I had options,” she said. “I knew I was not stuck in the madness of what I was seeing in inner city Detroit.”

Hampton said she also understood she had to chart her own path, and making it happen was her responsibility.

After earning an engineering degree she served seven years as an officer in the U.S. Air Force, including tours of duty during Operation Desert Storm.

Hampton said when she met Bevin she was impressed by his entrepreneurial spirit and his values. Kentucky needs entrepreneurial leadership in the governor’s office to help bring jobs and economic development to the state, she said.

As the election nears its final month, Hampton asked voters to talk to friends and neighbors about the importance of going to the polls to vote Nov. 3., and the importance of selecting candidates who reflect Kentucky’s conservative values.

Allison Ball speaks to the crowd Monday at the Bardstown Farmer’s Market.

Ball, a candidate for state treasurer, told an audience of about 50 people assembled at the Bardstown Farmer’s Market that many of the state’s conservative voters are registered Democrats who support conservative candidates.

Ball is a native of Floyd County in Eastern Kentucky, where 90 percent of voters are registered Democrats who vote as conservatives.

“We need to let them know that this Republican ticket best reflects their conservative values,” she said. “It also best reflects who we are as Kentuckians.”

The GOP candidates represent every region of the state, cities large and small, and three candidates under the age of 35, she said. And none of the slate of candidates is running for office because of who their parents, she said.

Ball is a bankruptcy attorney and former prosecutor, and she said her background makes her a good candidate to be a watchdog over the state’s finances. The state treasurer is also a member of the board that oversees the state teacher retirement system, which is an important role for the office given the system’s financial problems.

“We need a voice on that board to stand up for protecting our teachers and getting the system in good shape for the future,” Ball said.

State Sen. Jimmy Higdon also spoke, calling the Bevin-Hampton ticket the best way to get Kentucky moving again in the right direction.

The Nelson County Organization of Republican Women sponsored Monday’s event.

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