Jimmy Cousins – the ‘black sheep' of the Lenoir County Democratic Party?

It’s easy to understand why Jimmy Cousins might feel a little betrayed – the Democratic candidate and outgoing city council member finds himself without support from his fellow elected Democrats in his campaign to be Kinston’s next mayor.

Cousins defeated Ronnie Isler in the Democratic primary for the mayor’s office last month and expected to have the Democratic Party lining up to support him.

It hasn’t happened. After a May meeting that involved county political and business leaders, virtually every Democratic office-holder in Kinston and Lenoir County has lined up to throw their support behind Earl Harper, a former county commissioner who is running as an unaffiliated candidate for mayor.

Here’s the kicker, though: Harper is a former Republican. You’d think that in a city that hasn’t had a Republican mayor or city council member in the last century, Democrats would shy away from anyone who has had that nasty “R” behind their name.

It’s a turn of events that has perplexed Cousins, although he’s still very confident that he’s going to win the office on Nov. 3.

“I still have enough confidence that, even with all the help he’s getting from them, Earl’s going to have a hard time beating me,” Cousins said. “Now, he might, and I’m not going to say he is or isn’t going to beat me. I just don’t think it’s right that the Democraticf Party has turned against me when I was selected by the Democratic people in the city of Kinston to be their candidate of choice for mayor.”

Among the most vocal supporters of Harper are the current mayor and his wife, O.A. “Buddy” and MaryMac Ritch. The couple – who are the very face of the Democratic Party in Kinston – say the reason they’re supporting Harper over someone from their own party is because of Harper’s experience.

“Earl’s management abilities impress me the most,” Buddy Ritch said. “He managed a pretty big operation and has been very, very successful in business. We have a $95 million budget down there at the city; you need someone who can help put it together and keep it in tune with the amount of funds that we have.”

MaryMac Ritch said of her husband, “He’s not against Jimmy Cousins. He just thinks Earl Harper has the better qualifications.”

Harper, a very successful businessman who operated and then owned Evans Ford for many years, said he is happy to have the support of many of Kinston’s elected leaders, regardless of party.

“Party affiliation at this level is not like running for president,” Harper said. “These people have known me for a long time. They know me and what I stand for. We’ve all worked very well together.”

The Ritches and Cousins have been friends for many years; the Ritches were in a Sunday School class that Cousins taught for years and the two men often play golf together – as recently as Friday at the Kinston Country Club.

In fact, when Cousins ran for office the first time eight years ago, it was Ritch who encouraged Cousins to do so.

“Buddy Ritch came to me and asked me if I would consider running for office,” Cousins said. “I told him I would but that I had to check with my family first. I had lived in the country my whole life; I didn’t even know what a councilman did. I did my research and found out I could give back to the city that had given so much to me, so I told Buddy that, sure, I would run.”

But there’s another reason no big-name Democrat has jumped on the Cousins bandwagon; according to multiple sources – including Cousins, the current mayor and Democratic county commissioner George Graham – there was a meeting in May among community leaders to determine who would be the best candidates to lead Kinston in the next election.

It was decided that the people at the meeting would swing their support behind Harper for mayor, Cousins for his third term as a city councilman and Robbie Swinson for his second term on the council.

However, there was a disagreement at the meeting – Cousins said he made it known to these community leaders two years ago that he wanted to be the mayor in 2009. He said he didn’t immediately announce for the office, though, because of his wife’s health.

“I kept waiting for her to get better,” Cousins said. “Finally, she said, ‘It doesn’t look like I’m going to get better or worse, just go ahead and run for mayor; you have my blessing.’ ”

Cousins said city and county leaders, including Ritch, Robbie Swinson, George Graham, Jackie Brown and John Marston – among many others – attended the meeting in May.

“They, this so-called ‘group’, made the decision that I couldn’t run for mayor but that I could run for city council,” Cousins said. “Nobody makes a decision for me and tells me what to run for.

“I don’t need Buddy Ritch or MaryMac Ritch or George Graham to tell me when to run for public office. This is a free country; if you pay your filing fee, you can run for anything you want.”

Cousins said he became irritated by the group at the meeting.

“They said they would even pay for my campaign expenses if I ran for a seat on the council,” Cousins said. “I just said, ‘OK, if that’s how you want and that’s how you feel, I’m gone.’ I got up and walked out.”

Graham disagreed with Cousins’ account; he said everyone left the meeting thinking they had their candidates set in stone.

“He said he’d run for his seat and that he’d support Earl for mayor,” Graham recalled. “I left that meeting thinking that was the way it was and that it was time to get busy.

“Then, about two weeks later, it came out that he was running for mayor. That was completely contrary to everything that had been decided.”Ritch agreed with Graham.

“It was decided way back there that Jimmy would run for the city council and that Earl would run for the mayor’s job,” Ritch said. “We got together with a large group of people on both sides of Queen Street in East Kinston and Northwest Kinston. By far, they’re supporting Earl.”

Graham said it’s simple why he’s supporting Harper over Cousins.

“Earl is the epitome of a good community leader and citizen,” Graham said. “He’s been recognized with about every accolade that you can imagine. He gives back to his community. Having sat and worked with him, Earl went beyond the call of duty to help Lenoir County. He’s never waffled on anything that would make Lenoir County a better place to work, live or play.”

Other than the decisions made at the May meeting, Cousins thinks his city council vote against involuntary annexation a few months back was what probably hurt him with Ritch and the city’s Democratic Party leadership the most.

“I don’t know if they got upset that I didn’t vote for annexation or if they’re upset at some of the things I’ve voted for over the years, I really don’t know,” Cousins said, touting his independent voting record. “I didn’t vote for annexation and all of a sudden, (Ritch has) been very cool towards me.”

Cousins said he’s upset about the split in his party and the fact that Ritch, Graham, Swinson and other Democrats are actively campaigning for an unaffiliated candidate who used to be a Republican.

“It bothers me that they’re going over into the churches in East Kinston and soliciting votes,” Cousins said. “I don’t know what they’re telling the churches the reason for not voting for me. That bothers me a little bit.

“It makes me wonder why I have become the black sheep of the Democrat Party. It’s very unprofessional for the Democratic Party to do what they’re doing in the city of Kinston at this present time.”

And then there’s the third candidate in the mayor’s race: Republican B.J. Murphy, who narrowly lost to Ritch four years ago in his first run for public office.

“This is a direct result of the good ol’ boy network not wanting Kinston to have non-partisan elections, even though the voters voted two to one for it,” Murphy said. “It’s hard enough running against one Democrat, let alone two in the city of Kinston.”

Politics certainly makes for strange bedfellows – but it’s also going to potentially make for a spirited election in a couple of weeks. Stay tuned.

Bryan C. Hanks’ column appears every Sunday in The Free Press. You can reach him at 252-559-1074 or at bhanks@freedomenc.com. Want to read more about this issue? Check out Bryan’s blog at bhanks.encblogs.com.