Robert Dale Ford (born July 6, 1942 in Jonesborough, Tennessee) is an American politician and former baseball umpire.
"[4] When looking back on his MLB service, Rep. Ford says, "For an old country boy with no particular brains and definitely not good looking, I felt like that was OK."[5] Umpire union leader and Philadelphia attorney Richie Phillips brought a lawsuit against New York Yankees manager Billy Martin when Martin stated that Ford was a "stone liar, someone I'll bet $100 doesn't know how to read.
[7] Ford also sued Major League Baseball for retirement pay and interest; he was one of the umpires who were not rehired in the wake of the union's failed 1999 resignation strategy.
In 2002, Ford ran in the Republican primary for Tennessee State Representative District 6 against an incumbent, David Davis.
"[5] In 2006, after Davis announced he would not run again but would instead seek the US House District 1 seat for Tennessee, Ford again ran for State Representative.
This time he ran against Joshua Arrowood, Ethan Flynn, Patti Jarrett, Michael Malone, and Lee Sowers in the Republican primary.
In 2020, he unsuccessfully challenged incumbent Scott Buckingham for Washington County, Tennessee assessor of property in the GOP primary race.
Fiscally, he says that he is interested in increasing the state budget tremendously for education, emergency preparedness, law enforcement, health care, and welfare.
He supports the limits of contributions that can be given to candidates, though many claim that this goes against 1st Amendment rights and is a protection for incumbents.