Question: Has a write-in candidate ever won?

[Haole Girl]

Not at a local level (or Homecoming Queen level ;-)).

Just wondering.

Serious question. And, please don't attack my ignorance. Thanks.

[Warpy]

1. Yes.

Strom Thurmond. http://www.strom.clemson.edu/strom/bio.html

[Haole Girl]

4. You're kidding

Amazing.. especially considering the longevity of his term.

The things I learn on DU!

Thank you. :hi:

[kick-ass-bob]

2. If nothing else, Strom Thurmond won in '54

as a write in.

[Jennicut]

3. Strom Thurmond in 1954.

[WillParkinson]

5. Ignorance?

Hardly. It was a very interesting question.

I found this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write-in_candidate

[Haole Girl]

6. Thanks

It's easy to get an inferiority complex around here. There are so many intelligent and knowledgeable DUers!

And, I should have remembered that from History. :blush:

[MineralMan]

9. Yay for Wikipedia. Information on demand.

Thanks!

[sabrina 1]

7. Good question.

According to Wikileaks they rarely win, but it has happened. If they win enough votes in a primary, eg, then they can be put on the ballot in a general election.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write-in_candidate

The above link lists those who won, mostly in primaries for a place on the ballot, as write-in candidates.

Here is their entry for the history of write-in candidates for the Senate:

Senate

Republican William Knowland was elected in 1946 to the U.S. Senate from California, for the two-month term. The special election for the two-month term featured a November ballot with no names printed on it, and all candidates in that special election were write-in candidates.

Democrat Strom Thurmond was elected in 1954 to the United States Senate in South Carolina as a write-in candidate.

In 2010 incumbent Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski lost the Republican primary to Joe Miller, a Tea Party movement endorsed candidate.<3> Following her defeat in the Republican primary, she ran in the general election as a write in candidate. She filed a lawsuit requiring election officials to have the list of names of write in candidates distributed at the polls, and won the lawsuit.<4>

If Murkowski wins, she will only be one of very few who have won as a write-in candidate. Looks like the odds are against it though.

[Ian David]

8. Yes.

Sciortino wins on stickers

<snip>

Standing alongside his parents, Sciortino addressed a crowd of excited supporters at the Teele Square restaurant Sabur. “When I first ran four years ago I was told it couldn’t be done. This year I was told you can’t win on stickers. Well, we proved the naysayers wrong four years ago and today voters in Medford and Somerville rejected the campaign tactics of divisiveness and chose to vote on the issues,” he said to loud applause.

Sciortino, forced to run a write-in campaign after his nomination papers disappeared from his State House office in May, said he won because of a “massive army” of volunteers at the polls on Election Day. According to the Somerville election department, Sciortino beat Trane in Somerville by 72 votes.

At The Sons of Italy in Medford, Trane, the Ward 7 alderman, told a crowd of supporters, “We went up against a machine and fought the good fight.”

<snip>

Sciortino was first elected in 2004 when he upset eight-term incumbent Vincent Ciampa. That year, Ciampa ran an unsuccessful sticker campaign in the general election after losing in the primary. Sciortino is the first successful write-in candidate on the state level in Somerville since Sal Albano was elected to the senate in 1984 without his name on the ballot.

More:
http://somervillenews.typepad.com/the_somerville_news/2008/09/sciortino-wins.html

[BlueCheese]

10. Tony Williams won a DC mayoral primary as a write-in

... after his campaign astonishingly screwed up the petitions to get his name on the ballot. (He was the incumbent, after all.)