When it comes to unlikely gubernatorial bids, Troy Minton – a liberal, homeless man who is currently in jail – may be in a league of his own

Troy Minton is the only Democratic candidate for governor of Idaho. He is also homeless. The idiosyncrasies of his campaign do not end there.

“I know I’m innocent,” he said this week during a video call from a county jail in Boise, the state capital, where he has been held for almost two weeks for a probation violation. “I’m going to push forward.”

When it comes to unlikely electoral bids, Minton may be in a league of his own. Personal difficulties aside, he must contend with three Republican candidates in a place that hasn’t chosen a Democratic governor in decades. That’s not to mention any other Democrats who might run against him for the 2018 vote in the thinly populated Western state.

Even so, Minton is not exactly a political novice – he was once part of a lawsuit about a panhandling ban in Boise – and despite odds that might generously be described as long, he is steadfast. “We’re starting to lose what this country was made of and what this state was made of,” he said. He sees himself as the answer. Government “needs to be solely by the people, for the people”.

Some observers are nonplussed. Justin S Vaughn, a political scientist at Boise State University, hypothesized that if Minton’s goal is to raise awareness of homelessness issues, he could be successful. But if Minton is sincere in his gubernatorial aspirations, he said, “it’s kind of a silly lark”.



Holding a black receiver to his ear at the Ada County jail, with men in baggy beige or red prison suits milling around behind him, Minton described his vision. He wants to invest in education and redress imbalances between school districts, and is a supporter of Obamacare. He thinks wealth has corrupted politics. He would like to take a listening tour in an RV in which he would live. “I can travel across Idaho,” he said, and “be there for small towns and farmers and actually sit down and visit with them”.

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He is not letting the jail time go to waste: he has discussed his campaign with fellow prisoners, he said, and even secured some votes. Those who are ineligible to vote owing to felony convictions have told him their wives or girlfriends will vote for Minton in their stead.

A stoical, plainspoken 39-year-old described by one relative as “even-keeled”, Minton has lived in Boise for about 11 years. At different times he has couch-surfed and slept in a camper, and he listed a day shelter as his place of residence when he registered his candidacy (“He’s a dedicated person, he’s been very generous to other people,” said Mary Gutierrez, a volunteer there). He has a four-year-old son by an ex-girlfriend, with whom he says he has lost contact.

The roots of his present situation are in the Dallas area, where he grew up. As a child “he was always the center of attention”, his 99-year-old great-grandmother, Flora Hairell, recalled over the phone recently. But “he kinda had it rough”, said his great aunt, Kathy Hairell Walters.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Troy Minton at the age of about eight. His mother died when he was 15 years old. Photograph: Courtesy of Kathy Hairell Walters and Casey Minton

Minton’s mother was a nurse and his father a computer technician. When Minton was 15, his mother, Deborah, then 39, went into hospital for a hysterectomy. Right after the surgery she seemed fine, but she unexpectedly took a turn for the worse and passed away. “It hit us hard, we’re still not over it, because it was real sudden,” said Tony, the oldest of Minton’s two brothers, who dropped out of community college as a result. “We’re still lost.”

Because of Deborah’s death, “all three of them were just kind of scattered across the United States,” said Minton’s great-aunt. One brother ended up in a traveling carnival; another went into the navy and himself became homeless. She wondered whether Minton removed himself to Idaho because there were too many memories at home.

After driving a truck, Minton worked at a dairy farm and potato plant in the state, and landed in Boise, where he has taken gigs ranging from cleaner to firefighter. But he says one problem after another – job losses, his lack of rental history – left him without a permanent roof over his head. “I hate it so bad,” his great-grandmother said. “His mother would be turning over in her grave if she knew.”



In 2013, the ACLU of Idaho sought plaintiffs for a case against a Boise city ordinance that was intended to outlaw panhandling and other acts of solicitation such as busking. Minton volunteered, and won. ACLU of Idaho legal director Richard Eppink said he was “courageous” for taking part and being unashamed to publicly admit his penury. “Definitely even back then he was sort of politically minded,” he said. “I was impressed.”

The case kindled Minton’s gubernatorial ambitions, though they were seemingly born of a desire to help rather than strong partisan inclinations: he initially registered as a Republican candidate before switching parties. He has no rich backers or staff – before he went to jail he was saving up for business cards – and has 19 friends on his Facebook campaign page. “I need all the help I can get to make Idaho Democratic,” he said.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Troy Minton working as a firefighter. Photograph: Courtesy of Kathy Hairell Walters and Casey Minton

First he will need to resolve his legal issues. He was on probation for issuing checks without having funds to cover them, which he says was a simple error, and violated the probation with the theft of a phone. (He pled guilty because thinks contesting it would have been “a waste of taxpayers’ money”). He has a hearing on the probation violation next week.

Despite such obstacles, it might be a mistake to measure his campaign solely in terms of its viability. “It seems like it’s really empowering thing for him personally,” said Eppink of the ACLU. “And it’s probably an empowering thing for others that he knows.”

From jail, Minton said that in an unexpected way his candidacy evokes his mother, and connects her to him. “I’ve got a lot of her good traits,” he said. “I like to help people. I just want to move it one step further and help the whole state.”



His family is impressed. “As a brother it makes me real proud,” said Tony Minton. “Nobody thought Trump would win, either,” suggested Hairell Walters, the great-aunt.