Joseph O'Meara, the two-term mayor of Hankinson, North Dakota (population 919 in the 2010 census), wanted to leave office, but nobody else wanted to run for mayor and he didn't want a blank spot on the ballot, so he reluctantly filed to run for re-election. And he was unopposed in the recent election. But he convinced Loren Hovel, a former city councilman, to run, so the mayor campaigned for his opponent and told people to write in his opponent's name.
More below the orange-tentacled spaghetti monster...
If you want to read more, here's a link to the story: Hankinson mayor helps write-in candidate defeat him in election.
Months previous to the election, O’Meara had tried to get Hovel to enter the race with the goal of succeeding him as mayor.
“I wasn’t there yet,” said Hovel remembering his response to O’Meara’s offer to take over the part-time job that pays a whopping $140 a week.
And it was an offer.
No one had filed to run for the office and O’Meara was left to find his own replacement, serve another term or, in his terms, abandon ship.
“I wasn’t going to leave the ship without a captain,” said O’Meara of his decision to eventually file and run unopposed.
However, community members stepped forward and convinced Hovel that it was the right time to take over the duties of mayor.
So it seems that it all worked out. The current mayor (who was the only name on the ballot) convinced voters to write in the other guy's name. I don't know their politics, but I enjoyed reading this story of the guy who convinced voters not to vote for him.