Freedom Man Press

May 22nd, 2021 | by Diego Rodriguez

So we’re an entire year away from the primary election next May 2022. But we’ve already got 3 prominent candidates for Governor and a few extra “no-namers.” Ed Humphreys was first to announce his candidacy, followed by Janice McGeachin, and now Ammon Bundy has filed papers to run for Governor as well (though he has not made an “official announcement”).

So this begs the question—who do I vote for? Because I have a major concern, as I’m sure many of you do, that the conservative vote will be split and we’ll be stuck with Brad Little—even though the majority of Idahoans DO NOT want “NonBinary Brad” to be Governor.

In fact, 114,437 Idahoans voted against Brad Little in 2018 while only 72,518 voted for him. That means 58.8% of Idaho Republicans voted against Brad Little, but Tommy Ahlquist ensured that enough conservative votes got siphoned away from Raul Labrador and ended up handing the race to Brad Little. Sadly, only Raul Labrador had a proven track record as a conservative Republican. Tommy was just a wannabe.

Many people rightfully believe that Tommy was a plant from IACI or from other special interest groups to ensure Brad Little’s victory. That’s possible, but more than likely, it was Tommy’s own ego that kept him in the race, and IACI insiders kept feeding his ego and telling him he “could do it,” when in reality they were just working to ensure the conservative vote got split.

And yes, if history repeats itself we will have an even worse situation come May 2022—with the conservative vote being split 3 ways between nationally renowned Freedom Fighter Ammon Bundy, our existing Lieutenant Governor Janice McGeachin, and newcomer and youngster, Ed Humphreys.

Unlike Tommy Ahlquist from 2018, all 3 of these candidates appear to be genuine conservatives in their beliefs and principles. So the question now is what do we do? Who do I vote for? How do we prevent the candidates from splitting the vote?

These are all great questions and I want to just throw out my personal advice and perspective. Take it for what it is…

Here’s how I think Idaho conservatives should address the situation:

1. Give them time - let's give these candidates a few months to articulate their positions and define what makes them different and why they are the best candidate to lead Idaho. Because beyond the basic conservative platitudes of “supporting the 2nd amendment, being pro-life, pro-family, fighting for lower taxes, being tough on crime, and wanting to improve education,” blah blah blah—there are real differences between the candidates. Let’s give them a chance to articulate those differences.

2. Support the best candidate - in the end, there will be one candidate who is the best amongst the three. This does not mean that the other 2 are no good, but that one is clearly best suited for the job, or who simply has the best platform for the future of Idaho.

Think of it this way, if Ronald Reagan, Abraham Lincoln, and Teddy Roosevelt were all running against each other, one of them would demonstrate himself to be the best of the three, and this would not negate the value of the other two. But if you and I truly stand by principles, then we should support the candidate with the best principles and with the best platform for advancing freedom and liberty. Furthermore, we should stand by the candidate who has best demonstrated that they can actually ADVANCE the cause of freedom and not just talk about it. Because that’s one of our weakest points in the Conservative movement—we’re all talk and no action.

3. Ask the candidates with the least support to back out - after say 4-6 months of heavy campaigning, or some time in the first quarter of 2022, there should be a clear frontrunner in the race. The one with the most passionate supporters, the most funds being raised, and the most overall attention, with the strongest campaign platform. Raul Labrador was clearly this person in 2018. But Tommy Ahlquist ruined it for everyone, along with his minority supporters. This year, once the time has come, everyone should rally behind the clear frontrunner and ask the other 2 candidates to back out. They can run for Congress or some other position (because we desperately need to take out the trash in our Congressional delegation in Idaho anyway).

Likewise, here’s what I think we SHOULD NOT do:

1. Support the one who announced first - it is silly and juvenile to get mad at other candidates for announcing their candidacy after someone else did. In fact, there may yet still be another good conservative candidate to enter the race and that's okay! In this case, Ed was the first real conservative to announce. But, you should not support Ed just for being first. If you support Ed, it should be because he is the BEST candidate and not the FIRST candidate to announce.

2. Support whoever we think "can win" - this might be the biggest test of your own principles and the easiest manner in which liberals and establishment trash persuade conservatives against voting for the best candidate. They simply say, “he/she can’t win.” And then they repeat that over and over again. And weak, mushy, gullible conservatives fall for it.

Think how unprincipled it is to vote that way. You are not standing on principles but on a popular narrative reinforced by liberals, socialists, and establishment Republicans. In other words, everybody who is evil, wicked, and abominable. To fall for this line of thinking is to demonstrate that you're just a propagandized sheeple—like liberal Biden supporters.

Experience has shown that the majority of the time the narrative about a candidate is “he/she can’t win,” it typically means that he/she is the best candidate! They said Ronald Reagan couldn’t win for Governor or President. They said Donald Trump could never win. They mocked him to scorn! So don’t fall for that message. In fact, whoever gets the most people saying, “they can’t win,” is probably the candidate you need to pay the most attention to, because they’re the ones that liberals fear the most.

3. Vote for your ego instead of the best candidate - please do not vote for a candidate because you like them and selected them first, and now anything or anybody else feels like an attack against you personally, so you therefore DIG IN YOUR HEELS and refuse to look at other candidates because you “already made up my mind.” This is another juvenile and irresponsible way to vote. Your vote should be based on principles and not the personal protection of your own ego. Otherwise, confirmation bias will take over and you will be unable to see the genuine differences between the candidates because you will be too busy protecting your choice, instead of supporting the most valuable conservative principles.

So that’s my take on what we should do as voters. I already wrote about how I liked Ed Humphreys when he first announced. I definitely like Janice both as a person and as a conservative legislator. She seems legit to me. And of course, Ammon Bundy’s conservative record is completely unmatched by anyone in the country at this time.

So think about it—this is actually an exciting time to be here. Normally, we are LACKING for real conservatives with real principles. Now, for the first time in who knows how long, Idaho has the opposite problem when it comes to our Governor’s race—we have too many real conservatives to choose from. So let’s give them all a chance and some space to articulate their differences and then lets choose the best one to kick Brad Little to the curb in May 2022.

Diego Rodriguez
Freedom Man PAC

P.S. My suggestion for the 2 candidates who ultimately should bow out after a few months is to PLEASE PLEASE run for Congress. Our Congressional delegation is just as bad if not worse than Brad Little, and we need to get rid of them now!