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| Hattie Bryant |
While for the past couple of weeks I have heard the rumor that Quincy is not going to run, on February 11, the Tennessee Star reported that he is dropping out of the race for Tennessee’s 5th Congressional seat. At the same time, he announced that he’ll run for mayor in 2023 and he endorsed Morgan Ortagus, the woman who only registered to vote here a few months ago.
I happen to know that Quincy sought help from Ward Baker when he began his pursuit of the 5th a year ago. It was Ward Baker who discovered that Quincy owed $12,000 in back child support and told Quincy to clean up his life. Now Quincy is endorsing the candidate Ward Baker is working for. Why did Quincy quit?
- Was it Ward Baker who got Quincy to quit?
- Was it my exposing his many misrepresentations?
- Was it the $53,374 promised that never came into the campaign?
- Was it the fact that he is not a bona fide Republican which means to get on the ballot someone would have to vouch for him and there was a good chance he would not make it through the vouching process?
- Was it the Tennessee Legislature drawing a new 5th that would take Quincy out of his urban comfort zone?
About the same time McKnight quit his campaign he endorsed Ortagus and Andy Ogles expressed another view. In an interview with Michael Patrick Leahy, Mayor Ogles said, “You want to fly into my state, parachute in and represent me in congress? It’s ridiculous.” No one who knows McKnight should be surprised that he has aligned himself with a beautiful woman who will have millions to run her race. My guess is he also wants to win favor with Ward Baker.
Let’s have a look at how McKnight is leaving his campaign.
You can see that he raised $30,357.78 in 2021 for the campaign that is not now happening. He says he spent $26,707.98 yet the reporting only totals to a little over $21,000. That’s close enough, I guess. Interesting that the campaign paid a Brentwood consultant $3,000 and $18,000 went to firms near Washington DC that handled direct mail consulting, printing, and postage. Did anyone see a direct mail piece from Quincy? Please, I’d like to see it myself. I live in the old 5th and I should have been on the mailing list.
The 3rd quarter FEC filing shows “Debts and Obligations Owed to the Committee” to be $53,374. That means that between July 1 and September 30, 2021, someone or something had promised to give the campaign $53,374. One campaign veteran speculates that McKnight reported this to make it look like he had a great deal of support. We now know that support never materialized and there’s no way for anyone to know where this $53,374 would come from. I suggest that it came from McKnight’s imagination. (In my last article I made the mistake of assuming this cash was coming in and that was not the case.)
Yesterday at the celebration of life for Tim Skow many speakers told of how Tim helped them in so many ways. He recruited, encouraged, and worked hard for many Republican candidates and conservative causes. He helped me too. I’ve only been in Nashville since 2019 and when I saw Quincy McKnight and his girlfriend, Hana Cannon, take over my own club, Nashville Republican Women, I thought something was very wrong. I was a regular at First Tuesday, so I started my research with Tim Skow who corroborated my intuition. He pointed me to McKnight’s 2014 mismanagement of campaign funds then others filled me in on the multiple children being born to multiple women around the date of the 2014 primary. Others informed me about his unprofessional business operations.
When my first article appeared here, McKnight and/or Cannon lobbied Barbara Trautman, the president of Tennessee Federation of Republican Women and Mary Obersteadt the president of Nashville Republican Women to remove me from the organization. Trautman said in a phone call to me, “The candidate has come to me, and you need to step down.” She read to me an organization by-law that stated as a board member I am not allowed to speak ill of a Republican candidate.
I made it clear to her that my writing is based on research, and I am not speaking ill I am simply telling the truth. He was not a candidate then and he isn’t now.
I chose to resign from the board and the organization. Who wants to be around leaders who are afraid to lead? Granted, McKnight is a threatening person, and it follows that Barbara and Mary were afraid of Quincy McKnight.
Rod Williams did not fall for McKnight’s bullying. Rod got a call from someone who threatened to send the NAACP after him if he did not remove my articles about Quincy McKnight from his blog. Rod said he would not remove the articles and he would be happy to print McKnight’s rebuttals to what I have written (link). Months have passed and McKnight has not submitted an article to Rod.
Barbara Trautman and Mary Obersteadt are not the only ones afraid of McKnight. While I was on the board of Nashville Republican Women the board purchased an insurance policy to protect it from loose cannon candidates. And more than one person, after reading my articles, told me that they knew about everything I had exposed and had just not brought it up in polite company.
We have a few months to breathe free of McKnight before he throws himself into his campaign for mayor. I don’t know a soul who will vote for him. He can’t manage his own cash flow so why should we trust him with ours? A friend who knows McKnight says, “Quincy McKnight is a grease fire.”
To examine the campaign finance report online for yourself, here’s the link: https://www.fec.gov/data/committee/C00769950.
Hattie Bryant lives downtown Nashville and is active in civic affairs. You can learn about her at https://www.authorhattiebryant.com.
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