Kim Thatcher talks about race for Oregon Secretary of State

Sen.

Thatcher won the Republican candidacy for Secretary of State, the only statewide office currently held by a Republican.

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The office of oregon, secretary of state is up for grabs in the november election right now.

It's held by republican bev clarno.

Now we're joined by republican candidate kim thatcher.

Thanks so much for being with us today.

Thank you for having me.

Secretary of state, one of the few offices in statewide government held by a republican, what kind of challenges does that pose for you inovember?

Well, it will be an uphill battle.

Getting the word out to voters or the next six months is always the challenge.

We're going to have a very grassroots campaign.

Um, it's, you know, there was a lot of media coverage of the, of the democrat side of the ticket and the race that they had there.

So i have to catch up with all the media and, um, you know, message giving that i was.

Not able to get out during that same period of time, but you know, i look forward to meeting with voters, getting out there.

I'm glad the state's opening up and it'll make a little a little better, i think is how does the secretary of state's office reflect a republican point of view versus a democrat point of view?

You know, i see this office as a.

Well, it's a partisan obvious office, obviously, but i look at it as a position with nonpartisan responsibilities.

Being in charge of elections, you should not be playing favorites, should not be treating people differently because of their political affiliation.

It just needs to be managerial and by the book, and that's what i'm looking to do.

Certainly oregon is in the spotlight right now based on the possibility of other states increasing their malin ballot.

Contests.

How do you think oregon can play a role in that in the future?

Well, i think we've had a long, i think we're probably the state with longest experience in doing it, and it took us a while to get it set up after voters approved it.

And i'm doing the best with the vote.

My mail system is what we're good at and i think we need to be there as a resource for other states if that's what they decide to do.

And i think we have been there as a resource for other states that want to want to set this up.

Um, we, we always can improve every, um, style of voting, whether it's a polling place or whatever.

It can have its problems and issues.

And we need to look at, do a top to bottom, look at our election system to make sure it's the best that we have and, and keep it the best that it can be.

Now, secretary of state is next in line for the governor's position as we saw the kate brown taking over for governor kitzhaber.

How would you explain to voters your platform and how does it different from kate brown.

Well, i'm not running for governor.

I will not be on the ticket into 2022.

I am looking to serve out, uh, the position of secretary of state.

Yes.

It could end up being, um, something like that.

One of the responsibilities of the secretary of state is to, um, step in if there should be something that happens with the governor.

But you know, that would be a very unusual set of circumstances.

Like it was when, uh, kate brown took over.

When you look at the future for your campaign, what challenges do you have given our situation with a pandemic and the fact that you're running in a state that has traditionally elected democrats to higher positions in the state?

Well, and the pandemic actually changed the focus of the campaign.

I thought, i think in many ways, one of the job, one for me, um, will be trying to get the state back on its feet and trying to look at how we responded to this, um, situations that we can do better next time.

I think that, um.

Okay.

Some point we need to make sure our agencies are responding, um, in a, in the best way possible.

Look at the employment mess and people not being able to get any unemployment due to no fault of their own.

And they're having, they're struggling out there and we need to do better.

And that's why i think that, uh, looking at how we responded is job number one,