State Rep. John Crawford, opponent Jessica Means speak to Republicans

KINGSPORT — Beware: Another contested Republican primary is coming to Sullivan County. Six days after a sometimes heated county GOP primary mayoral race ended May 5, including a barrage of so-called "dark money" flyers in mail boxes across the county, the GOP incumbent and his challenger in the District 1 Tennessee state House seat spoke to the Greater Kingsport Republican Women Monday. State Rep. John Crawford, R-Kingsport, and challenger Jessica Means, a one-term county commissioner from Kingsport seeking a two-year term in the District 1 seat instead of a second four-year commission term, presented themselves and their campaigns to the club in a meeting room of the Chop House restaurant. It was the first forum in that contested race. Means, Crawford and lone District 2 state House hopeful Gary Stidham, a one-term county commissioner from Kingsport, also fielded questions from the audience. Even District 3 state Rep. Timothy Hill, R-Blountville, was drawn into a discussion about certificate of need and certificate of public advantage, commonly called CON and COPA that the General Assembly approved earlier this year. Hill faces a challenge from lone Democrat Lori Love in the Nov. 3 state general election, while either Crawford or Means will face no further opponents in the November general election. The primary race beween County Commissioner Zane Vanover and county school board Vice Chairwoman Angie Stanley included "dark money" political action committee flyers and prompted a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation probe of one PAC that distributed a series of anti-Vanover flyers with a similar-sounding name to a group not connected with the flyers, as did another PAC. A third PAC distributed pro-Vanover mailers, as did a Vanover campaign-paid flyer. Stanley attended the Monday event. Vanover did not, but his wife, Kay Vanover, did. PACs can distribute flyers and other campaign materials not authorized or approved by candidates, and the revenue source and exact spending of PACs is sometimes murky at best. HEALTHCARE Crawford said the General Assembly doing away with the CON and COPA by 2028 is a good thing. The COPA allowed Wellmont Health System and Mountain States Health Alliance to merge into a hospital monopoly of sorts without raising federal antitrust law issues. "Hopefully that will bring some competition into our area," Crawford said, adding that it is good Watauga Orthopaedics Center For Advanced Bone and Joint Surgery opened in Kingsport near Tri-Cities Airport in Blountville. "We need more of that" to serve an older population, he said. "The healthcare monopoly should never have happened to begin with," Means said of what she called the top issue among voters with whom she's talked. Crawford called on Hill to address the matter since he serves on the Health Committee that helped craft the legislation in question. "It is the genuine first step to the unraveling of Ballad (Health) as we know it," Hill said. SCHOOL CHOICE Crawford said he supports the Education Freedom Scholarships also known as vouchers, which uses public taxpayer dollars to pay or help pay for parents to education their children in private schools. However, he said the legislation approved this year expanded that program and increased the funding amount per student each year, although he said the legislation holds public school systems "harmless" in funding for those students going to private schools for a year. Stanley, who attended the event, said that Ballad's monopoly was the biggest issue for voters overall as she campaigned. "It's not our schools that are bringing us down. It's the schools in Memphis. Teachers there simply want to get a paycheck," Crawford said, adding that his goal for the state is to go from the bottom or near the bottom in state per-pupil education funding to the top 12 to 15. He said the state has funded $4.2 billion in public education the past four years but spent $125 million last year on vouchers and has increased that to $250 million in the 2026-27 budget. TURNING POINT Aside from being a supporter of school choice and parental rights, Means also advocates for Turning Point USA. Lakie Derrick, to serve on the County Commission after winning a GOP primary with no opposition in August, works for Turning Point. The two worked for a memorial vigil for Kirk last year at the old County Courthouse after his assassination on a college campus in Utah. "I'm willing to pick up the torch where Charlie Kirk left it," Means said of the Turning Point USA founder killed by a gunman during a college speaking event last year. She said young people need to know the value of a smaller government, less government, freedom and Christian values. "I've not been in politics very long." Means also said she wants to protect young people from suicide and pornography. Means serves on the Finance Committee of the commission, is a farmer and businesswoman who has been an instructor at the YMCA in Kingsport for 15 years and serves on the county's Health Council. She said she grew up in a trailer park with a single mother and sometimes on food stamps or public food assistance and learned "hard work is the way to success." "I have really fought hard to cut wasteful spending" by county government, Means said. "I want to take that to the state House. FEWER LAWS Stidham and Crawford said cutting the number of laws is probably more important that passing new ones. "We need to be backing up a lot of these," Stidham said. He said one is that primary and secondary school students buying items to resell for fundraising must pay sales tax on those items for resell, which "needs to be reversed." Means said, "As Republicans, we should have less laws, more freedom." SECOND AMENDMENT All three candidates said they supported the Second Amendment right to bear arms. Stidham said he opposes undue restrictions on carrying a firearm in any publicly funded park or facility, while Means said she is definitely pro-Second Amendment. Crawford said, "If I'm alive and breathing, I have a gun on me somewhere." ICE, ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION All three House candidates also said they support efforts by ICE or Immigration and Customs Enforcement to find illegal, undocumented immigrants in Tennessee and applaud Sheriff Jeff Cassidy's cooperation with ICE. Stidham said he fears Sullivan County may move from a red or Republican county to a purple county judging from the Feb. 19 confontations at and after the commission meeting. Protesters also spoke at the April 16 commission meeting.