Speaker Williams Re-Elected as Independent in Tennessee

Tennessee state representative, and Speaker of the House, Kent Williams is headed towards winning re-election by a wide margin.

Williams was elected to the House in 2006 and re-elected in 2008 as a Republican, but in February 2009 the executive committee of the state Republican Party stripped Williams of his party affiliation after he voted with all 49 House Democrats to elect himself Speaker.

Williams said he still feels like a Republican, but ran for re-election as an independent and is leading Republican nominee Jerome Cochran by a vote of 7,937 to 5,899.