The Lonely Republicans

continued

That shouldn’t be difficult. Though Taylor received 5,538 votes in the primary, Clayton polled 16,027—and will presumably pick up the lion’s share of the 13,709 votes cast for the other two Democratic contenders as well. Add in the tens of thousands of Democratic presidential voters expected to show up on November 4, and it’s hard to see how Clayton could lose. Yet Taylor says he is “very, very much expecting to win. According to the poll on my website, forty-four percent of the voters are highly dissatisfied with the department and want change. If the voters really want change, they’ll vote for me.”

Clayton, forty-three, is a former sheriff’s department commander now working as a national consultant to police departments on racial profiling. Taylor, thirty-two, is a fourteen-year veteran of private security firms now working for Great Lakes Protection Inc.

Both candidates criticize Dan Minzey. “Leadership is lacking in the sheriff’s department,” says Clayton, “a lack of internal direction, and not just in policies and procedures but in right and wrong.” Taylor concurs: “We need a better leader, someone who will lead by example and demand a higher level of accountability from the whole staff.”