Ashburton mayoral hopeful Jeff Ryan has ditched his Make Ashburton Great Again slogan.
The 55-year-old dad of three announced MAGA as his slogan last week when he said he would run for the mayoralty.
Now due to feedback from the public, he said he realised it was associated with anti-Trump sentiment. American president Donald Trump infamously stood on the slogan Make America Great Again.
Ryan said he was not a Trump supporter.
‘‘I look at him and think ‘There’s a lot of good he does’. But he undoes that good with a lot of crazy comments, and I think he’s reckless as a politician,’’ Ryan said.
He defended choosing the slogan in the first place.
‘‘I just thought it was a catchy sort of a phrase,’’ Ryan said.
And he had liked its meaning, being to make Ashburton great.
Ryan has attracted both praise and derision on social media, mostly around his planned campaign goal of replacing Ashburton’s second bridge project with a Dorie to Hinds bypass.
‘‘First sensible person to mention anything regarding the congestion… I don’t know how many I’ve heard saying we need a bypass not a bridge,’’ said one commenter on The Ashburton Courier Facebook page.
‘‘A man talking sense at last,what a good idea to bypass the town that a lot of people have wanted instead of the Chalmers Ave option that the majority at the time did not want but council ignored,’’ said another.
Critical comments included ‘‘What a bloody dreamer’’, ‘‘Dorie to Hinds seems pie in the sky thinking, if the article had read Dromore to Winslow I’m sure it would attract a lot of support’’, ‘‘OMG is this guy serious… the second bridge is going to ease the congestion’’.
Ryan said he welcomed criticism, and believed any personal attacks were merely ‘‘knee-jerk’’.
‘‘I think most of the negative comments are good, they are raising points, they are raising awareness,’’ he said.
Ryan was confident of winning the election, and believed he would do so by a landslide.
Meanwhile, incumbent Mayor Neil Brown said this week he will make an announcement at the March 19 district council meeting on whether or not he will stand again.
The second-term mayor has served on the district council for 21 years. He said he had still not made up his mind whether to restand.
His decision would be based on the service he had already given, his family, and his career.
‘‘I’m still a farmer, and I don’t get to do a lot of that,’’ Brown said.
It would not be based on other candidates.
‘‘It will be my decision,’’ he said.
