2026 Ashe County Primary Candidates Forum

The 2026 Ashe GOP candidate forum was held on Tuesday, February 10th, at 5:30 pm at the Ashe County courthouse. A warm and interested turnout of 75 local citizens came to hear from 11 candidates.

Participating candidates were requested to submit responses to a Candidate Questionnaire and from their responses a biography and campaign summary was compiled for each candidate into a handout provided to each attendee. This was to optimize the time allotted to each candidate during the forum.

(This handout is available for downloading above.)

The forum was moderated by Ashe County GOP Chairman, Jonathan Jordan.

The forum format for each candidate in a contested race was as follows:

• Opening remarks: 2 minutes

• Two questions from the moderator, with up to 2 minutes per response

• One written question solicited from the audience (drawn from a pool of submitted questions), with up to 2 minutes for response

• Closing remarks: 2 minutes

Attendees were invited to write questions for the candidates and submit these before the forum began to be included in the "hat" from which questions were drawn for each candidate.

The candidates who attended were:

For County Commissioner – Todd McNeill and Jerry Powers

For Register of Deeds – Beth Brooke

For Clerk of Courts – Sherman Lee

For Board of Education – Wes Calbeath, Dianne Eldreth, Shane Little, and Janet Ward

and For Sheriff – Earl Cox, Phil Howell, and Brandon Shepherd

Events like this are critical for informed voters. The Primary is the most important election as it is then that the candidates for each party are selected.

The Primary is YOUR opportunity to make your voice heard about who our actual candidates will be in the upcoming November midterm elections.

The voting schedule is as follows:

Feb. 12, 2026: In-person early voting begins.

Feb. 17, 2026: Absentee ballot request deadline (5 p.m.).

Feb. 28, 2026: In-person early voting ends (3 p.m.).

March 3, 2026: Primary Election Day.

March 3, 2026: Absentee ballot return deadline (7:30 p.m.).

We invite you to checkout other tools and websites in our Resources area to assist you in making your voting decisions.