County commissioners races aren’t typically high-dollar contests. This year, however, money involved is even lower than usual.

County Commissioner Craig Pierce, running for re-election is the only Republican candidate who’s reported any money in his campaign account. Incumbent Mike Caskey and challenger Johnny Love haven’t crossed a $1,000 threshold that requires candidates to start reporting money raised. Democratic challenger Veleria Levy and Libertarian challenger Mark Lyerly also haven’t crossed the $1,000 threshold.

All of the money in Pierce’s campaign account is his own. Late last year, Pierce transferred $5,000 of his own money to his campaign account.

His campaign still contains most of the money he’s transferred in. Pierce’s latest finance reports show his campaign still has $4,613.09.

Caskey is running for re-election and Love ran in 2014. Both are allowed to use campaign signs from previous years.

Caskey, Love and Pierce will face one another in the March 15 primary election. Levy and Lyerly will compete against the primary election winners in November’s general election.

Wednesday forum will be rebroadcast

This week’s county commissioners and State House District 77 candidate forum will be shown a number of times leading up to the March 15 primary.

Access 16, a government access channel, will show the candidate forums nightly at 6 p.m. It’s available to Fibrant TV subscribers and Time Warner Cable subscribers in Salisbury.

The channel is managed by the City of Salisbury.

Caskey, Love and Pierce participated in the county commissioners forum. Incumbent Harry Warren and challenger Andrew Poston participated in the District 77 forum.

Both forums were held at Catawba College on Wednesday.

Another poll finds North Carolinians like Trump

A poll released this week by Elon University found Republicans and independents who lean Republican favor businessman Donald Trump over all other candidates.

The poll included responses from 733 registered Republicans and Republican-leaning independents. Elon University also interviewed 728 registered Democrats.

Among Republican respondents, Elon University found 28 percent favored Donald Trump. The next highest percentage was 19 percent for Ted Cruz. Marco Rubio received support from 16 percent of respondents.

Among Democratic respondents, 47 percent picked former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as their top choice. U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., received 37 percent of support from Democrats in the poll.

Trump would lose against Clinton or Sanders in the November general election, according to the poll results.

Foxx, Hudson oppose closing Guantanamo Bay

Neither of Rowan’s current members of the U.S. House support President Barack Obama’s recently introduced plan to close Guantanamo Bay Prison.

Obama this week announced plans to close Guantanamo Bay — a prison for suspected war criminals in Cuba — by the time he leaves office. His plan faces stiff opposition from Congress, with two of Rowan’s U.S. House members among the pack of skeptical politicians.

Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-5, criticized the plan as “bringing dangerous terrorists to America in a statement following Obama’s announcement this week.

“President Obama’s stubborn insistence on fulfilling an ill-advised campaign promise to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay distracts from ongoing threats to American national security and highlights the failures of his foreign policy agenda,” Foxx said.

Rep. Richard Hudson also criticized Obama’s plan as “doubling down on his dangerous campaign promise.”

“Despite the president’s attempts, folks continue to agree that we don’t want these war criminals and hardened terrorists transferred to American soil — which current law prohibits — or transferred to other countries to return to the battlefield against us,” Hudson said in a prepared statement. “I am confident that Congress will scrutinize the proposal and reject any plan that puts our national security at risk.”

Contact reporter Josh Bergeron at 704-797-4246.