Roe Defeats Davis In 1st District

By The Continuous News Desk

Published: August 8, 2008

Less than 1 percentage point – or just 460 votes – separated the Republican candidates vying for their party’s nomination to run in November for Tennessee’s 1st District U.S. House seat.

According to unofficial totals late Thursday, challenger Phil Roe bested incumbent U.S. Rep. David Davis with 25,918 votes, 50.1 percent, to Davis’ 25,458 votes, or 49.2 percent.

Roe was the first candidate since 1966 to upset an incumbent Tennessee congressman in a primary election

He will face Democrat Rob Russell of Kingsport for the spot in the Nov. 4 election.

“We’ve had a tough, knockdown, drag-out primary, and now it’s time for the Republican Party to come back together,” Roe, the Johnson City mayor, said from his campaign headquarters late Thursday. “I do believe we pulled this off, and I just can’t believe I received so much support.”

The Herald Courier had prearranged plans to speak with Davis after the votes were counted. However, Ryan Tronovitch, Davis’ communications director, said, “We’re not commenting at all. We’re going to wait until we see the numbers tomorrow.”

Mahmood Sabri, the third Republican in the race, gathered just 296 votes.

Roe fell short as a 2006 candidate, but recent polls and campaign funding numbers revealed he was in a serious duel with Davis this time around.

He won the most votes in Washington County, both candidates’ home turf. Of 12,037 total votes, Roe received 6,520 votes, or 54.2 percent to Davis’ 5,444 votes, or 45.2 percent. 

Roe also bested Davis in Sullivan County with a total of 4,985 votes or 54.5 percent to Davis’ 4,110 votes, or 44.9 percent.

He also topped Davis in early and absentee voting in the district’s two most populated counties, Washington and Sullivan.

“I expected to win in Washington County if the voters came out, but I wouldn’t say I expected to win the primary,” Roe said.

The solidly Republican 1st District has not sent a Democrat to Washington since 1881, but Roe plans to get back on the campaign trail soon.

“I’ve still got a race to run,” he said “I plan to take a week or 10 days off and then go around the district and thank people.”

As Thursday’s primary neared, accusations of foul play mounted and both candidates ramped up newspaper, TV and radio time to get their messages out.

Roe’s basic points of contention, backed by his populist approach and accompanying campaign slogan, “People. Not Politics,” was that Davis cared little for the common man.

During the last few days leading up to Thursday’s vote, Davis had tallied nearly $600,000 in campaign contributions with nearly half that amount coming from political action committees.

Davis, a staunch social conservative, denied any wrongdoing by accepting the PAC money and accused Roe of profiting from Johnson City road contracts and hiring a lobbyist at taxpayer expense.

The campaign came to a boil at the Carter County Republican Pig Roast on Saturday when Roe challenged Davis to hash out the accusations on the spot.

Davis refused, but did address more than 500 visitors before leaving Sycamore Shoals State Park.

“I’d like to thank the Bristol Herald Courier,” Roe said in the telephone interview. “I’d like to thank the paper for exposing some of the facts behind the issues and for distinguishing facts from mere figures.”
Davis won the seat in 2006 when Bill Jenkins retired after serving 10 years in Congress. Davis won only 22 percent of the vote in a wide-open primary that year in which Roe finished fourth.

Roe’s campaign focused attention on Davis’ connection with lobbyists and his acceptance of a generous amount of PAC money, including donations from major oil companies, such as Exxon-Mobil.

Roe, as promised, never accepted a penny of special-interest money during his campaign. Instead, he relied on individual donations and topped Davis in contributions during the last full quarter, from April 30-June 30. He was only one of a few challengers who more money in any single quarter than did an incumbent U.S. congressman, according to the Federal Elections Committee. Meanwhile, election administrators from Washington, Sullivan, Carter, and other counties within Tennessee’s 1st District on Thursday reported a lighter than usual voter turnout.

“I’m especially surprised more people didn’t come out, since both Congressman Davis and Mayor Roe live here in Johnson City,” said Connie Sinks, Washington County’s administrator of elections.

The current annual salary for members of the House is $169,300, according to a Congressional Research Service report.

The district has been a safe-haven for the Republican Party, having held the seat for all but four years since 1859. The GOP has represented the district continuously since 1881. 
Tennessee’s 1st Congressional District is comprised of Carter, Cocke, Greene, Hamblen, Hancock, Hawkins, Johnson, Sullivan, Unicoi, and Washington counties and parts of Jefferson County and Sevier County. Cities and towns represented within the district include Bristol, Butler, Elizabethton, Erwin, Greeneville, Johnson City, Jefferson City, Kingsport, Morristown, Mountain City, Roan Mountain, Sevierville.

Andrew Jackson was the first U.S. Representative of the district in 1796-97.

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