After coming up a mere 2,201 votes shy out of the more than 950,000 ballots cast in the 2015 race for Attorney General, Sen. Whitney Westerfield has announced he will once again vie for the post.
“Pretty excited about the idea of running again and showing people why I’m the best choice for the job,” Westerfield said in an exclusive interview with Pure Politics.
Westerfield said he and his wife had been discussing another run for the Constitutional office over several months. One point in their discussion was clear, if Westerfield ran he needed an earlier start to build up his campaign war chest, increase name id and travel every area of the commonwealth.
By declaring his intent to run now, Westerfield effectively has two-years to trace the state, compared to the 10-months, he said he had in 2015.
“Now that I’m running again I know what I’m getting into. I know what it takes. I know what works best, what doesn’t work best,” he said.
“Having been through the experience once I’m much more familiar with the process and what works and what doesn’t.”
The Hopkinsville Republican has already been meeting with potential donors, and said that “the interest is strong” both from people who donated to his campaign before and those he said supported current Attorney General Andy Beshear.
Westerfield does not anticipate ramping up campaign staff until the spring or summer of 2018, “and really get much more intensive and intentional about what we’re doing.”
Part of Westerfield’s message to voters will be focused around Kentucky’s heroin and opiate crisis, as well as cybercrimes. Westerfield will also focus on conflict of interests he feels Beshear has in the office.
Some speculate Beshear will run for Governor, Westerfield says he is “indifferent” as to what Beshear does, but says the issues will still be relevant to his campaign narrative despite what the Democratic Attorney General chooses to do in politics.
Hear what Westerfield has to say about President Trump and times he’s spoken out against the President in the interview below.