Standing on the same stage as Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders will be two candidates that have little name recognition.
Introducing Lincoln Chafee and Jim Webb.
While they made CNN’s debate criteria, few people have ever heard of them. According to the latest NBC News/ Wall Street Journal poll, 55 percent of Democratic primary voters didn’t know Webb and 56 percent of voters didn’t know Chafee.
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Politics runs in Chafee’s family. His followed in his father’s footsteps and served as both the governor and senator of Rhode Island.
While Chaffee is running for the Democratic nomination, he was not always a registered Democrat. Even though he is pro-choice and supports same-sex marriage, he served in the Senate as a Republican from 2000 until 2007. When he ran for governor of Rhode Island in 2010 he was an independent. He switched to the Democratic Party during his gubernatorial tenure in 2013.
His campaign addresses his party changes. His motto is “Politics change. Values don’t.”
As president Chafee is extremely interested in switching to the metric system.
While in the Senate, Chaffee was the only Republican to vote against the Iraq War, a position central to his low-polling campaign against Hillary Clinton who did vote for the Iraq War.
Webb is a one-term senator (by choice) of Virginia. He served as Navy Secretary under President Ronald Reagan but entered politics because of his stern opposition to the Iraq war. He jumped in the race because he thinks Democrats have lost their focus on working-class voters.
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Webb has an eclectic background. In addition to his long service in the military, he has won an Emmy for journalism, written ten books and was a screenwriter and producer for the 2000 film “Rules of Engagement.”
Neither candidate has maintained a heavy campaign schedule, giving voters relatively few opportunities to get to know them.
Leigh Ann Caldwell