Yates wins GOP primary in Lexington state House race. Lawsuit against him dismissed.
Aaron Yates, whose campaign focused on a DUI charge against opponent Monteia Munday, easily won the Republican primary election Tuesday in a state House race in Fayette County. Later Tuesday, Yates won a lawsuit seeking to remove him from the ballot.
Yates will face Democrat Cherlynn Stevenson, a non-profit event planner, in the 88th House District in southeastern Fayette County. She was unopposed in the Democratic primary election. Registered Republicans hold a slight edge in the district — 20,976 Republicans to 20,090 Democrats.
The race took a turn June 11 when Alicia Huff, a Lexington Realtor who lives in the 88th District, filed a lawsuit in Fayette Circuit Court against Yates, claiming he should be disqualified for not meeting residency requirements.
Chris Wiest, an attorney for Yates, said late Tuesday that Fayette Circuit Judge Julie Muth Goodman dismissed the lawsuit.
“This legal action against my client was baseless from the start,” said Wiest. “It simply was designed to harass Mr. Yates.”
The attorney for Huff, Steven Megerle, said she is “seriously considering” an appeal.
In the other Kentucky House District contest in Fayette County, Shirley Flynn Mitchell won the Democratic primary against challenger Sean “Mike” Pickard. Unofficial results Tuesday showed Mitchell with 5,576 votes to Pickard’s 847.
Mitchell, a former civil engineering officer in the U.S. Navy and a digital customer experience manager at Valvoline, will face Republican Killian Timoney, director of plant operations at Fayette County Public Schools, in the November general election for the 45th House District.
“I am excited for the opportunity to represent this district in Frankfort to fight for our teachers, our students, our environment, and our essential workers who risked so much for us during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mitchell said in a news release.
Pickard said his opponent “ran a good campaign. I hoped for different results, but I’m happy that the 45th District Democrats showed up and exercised their right to vote.”
Republican Stan Lee, one of the most conservative members of the state House, has represented the district since 2001, but he decided not to seek re-election this year.
The most publicized House race in Fayette County was in the 88th, where voters had to consider a DUI charge against Mundy, a 31-year-old attorney.
Yates, 35, said Tuesday the DUI charge against his opponent “helped but it wasn’t the only reason I won.”
Yates, who runs a consulting company, said he had “a great network of volunteers and much support from family and friends.”
Unofficial results in the race released Tuesday by the Fayette County Board of Elections showed Yates with 4,445 votes and Mundy with 1,466.
Mundy was arrested the night of April 25 in Madison County and charged with driving under the influence, leaving the scene of an accident and failing to wear a seat belt
She later pleaded guilty to the DUI and the other two charges were dismissed. She said she had taken medication earlier that day, apologized, asked for forgiveness and hoped that voters to hold against her what she said was her only run-in with the law in her life.
During the campaign, Yates said the DUI charge showed “a major flaw in her character.”
Mundy said Yates attacked her “because he’s desperate to curry favor with extremist out-of-state libertarians funding false attack ads and websites.”
This story was originally published June 30, 2020 at 11:06 AM.
