By: Danny Jacobs

I’ve been working on a story about contested judicial elections and coincidentally came across a story about such a race in Oklahoma. (Shameless self-promotion: my story is slated for our Aug. 9 Maryland Lawyer.)

John Mantooth was running for a seat in on Oklahoma’s District Court in Tuesday’s primary election. (No word on whether he is related to Wes.) Mantooth’s adult daughter took out an ad in a local paper with the following headline: “Do Not Vote For My Dad!” There’s also a website of the same name.

The ad claims Mantooth is neither a good dad nor a good grandfather. The daughter, Jan Schill, said she’s never had a good relationship with her father, who divorced her mother in 1981. Mantooth said he was “saddened” and “hurt” by the ad but still loves his daughter.

Mantooth also suspected politics had something to do with the ad. Schill’s husband was once a law partner of Greg Dixon, one of Mantooth’s opponents.

“For a person to believe that Greg Dixon had nothing to do with this is like trying to believe that cows give chocolate milk,” Mantooth said.

Dixon and Mantooth, incidentally, were the top two vote-getters in Tuesday’s primary and will face off in the general election in November.