Democratic-NPL candidate Tracy Potter is still on track to complete an old-fashioned soapbox tour of North Dakota's 53 county courthouses as he campaigns for the U.S. Senate against Republican Gov. John Hoeven.
Potter said a Monday afternoon visit to McClusky in Sheridan County brought him up to 42 courthouse speeches so far, but it was the first one he'd done in a couple of weeks.
"I'm a little rusty, but we're going to finish," he said.
Potter plans to visit three more counties Wednesday -- Oliver, Mercer and McLean -- leaving him eight more stops to go by Nov. 2. He said he scheduled the tour to first visit the more rural areas of the state.
"I wanted to leave the cities for last," he said. "I'm hoping to have larger crowds there."
ADVERTISEMENT
His speech in Bowbells, the county seat of Burke County in northwestern North Dakota, drew about 30 people, the highest turnout of the tour. While his visit to Sioux County didn't draw a single person, Potter said he still delivered a speech about the history of Lakota and U.S. relations.
"A little dog came, and the dog didn't even stay for the full speech," he said.
But Potter said he made the best of it, shaking hands with customers in the grocery store and visiting with people at an amateur basketball tournament.
"We use these as an opportunity to campaign in some of the more rural areas," he said.
Potter said he starts his speeches with some history, sometimes discussing U.S. Census data for the county or the architecture of the courthouse he's visiting.
He also gives a stump speech about "whatever issue is on my mind of the day," he said, but each speech is a little different.
Potter said the county courthouse tour was thought up as a "campaign gimmick" and he never expected to draw large crowds.
"It was a way to portray just how grassroots our campaign was that I would be on the steps of every county courthouse," he said.
ADVERTISEMENT
But his visits have received good media coverage around the state, he said, especially in the rural weekly newspapers.
And Potter said the tour has given him a view of the state's infrastructure that he couldn't have gotten without visiting each county.
"You'd have this courthouse, which would be just beautiful, well kept-up, a 100-year-old courthouse," he said. "Then you'd drive down Main Street and it would be boarded-up storefronts. This was a very good education for a candidate for the U.S. Senate."
Johnson reports on local politics. Reach Johnson at (701) 780-1105; (800) 477-6572, ext. 105; or send e-mail to rjohnson@gfherald.com .
