Oklahoma City – As early voting begins in the metro area’s municipal races, the gap between the two candidates for OKC’s Ward 1 is widening.
Bradley Carter’s campaign, buoyed by his resounding primary victory, has continued its upward momentum by focusing their efforts on the three Oklahoma County precincts where Varnell bested them in February (the only precincts that Varnell actually won). This continues the strategy that carried them to the February 9th victory, where they focused the entirety of the campaign’s energy on shoring up support in their own back yard of Canadian County.
Now the strategy appears to be paying off in spades, as Carter continues to hold a commanding lead in Canadian County, allowing him to turn his focus to capturing the three precincts that Varnell won. According to the campaign, the results have been strong, with the residents of the west OKC neighborhoods responding overwhelmingly favorably to Carter’s strong leadership, and quiet resolve.
Varnell, on the other hand, appears to have spread himself too thin from the beginning leaving him struggling to find votes as we near the finish line. Varnell split his focus in the primaries between Oklahoma and Canadian County, and as a result won neither. He split the Oklahoma County precincts with Jay Sherrill, Nana Dankwa, and the rest of the primary candidates, picking up only 3. Meanwhile, he lost every single precinct in Canadian County to Carter by a resounding margin.
Now as we near the finish line, reports from the field state that Varnell’s campaign has gone stone-dead silent on social media, while the candidate has spent the majority of the last couple of weeks going to the voters who voted in February begging them to switch sides and vote for him over Carter.
It appears like Varnell, having spent all of his political capital in February, is out of gas…and out of time.