The race is on!
Look out Mike Rogers (R, AL-03) that bullet you dodged last November is coming around again -- more experienced, better known and, hopefully, with more institutional backing this time. Josh Segall just announced he will mount another campaign against Rogers in Alabama's third congressional district. Mike Rogers was most recently in the news for referring to Speaker Nancy Pelosi as "Tom Delay in a skirt" and "crazy." Did I mention Josh has an ActBlue account?
Quoting from the Segall press release:
"It’s time for a new direction. I am a fiscal conservative who will work to create and attract 21st Century jobs to east Alabama so that hardworking people can get ahead," said Segall.
"Alabama is suffering under irresponsible policies that bail out greedy executives who created this mess and leave hardworking Alabama families holding the bag. Rogers supported the Wall Street bailout, but did nothing for Main Street Alabama. He voted to send Alabama jobs overseas, when what we needed was a plan to create good jobs at home. It’s time to stand up to special interest politics and put Alabama families first once again," said Segall.
"Rural Alabama has been suffering for a long time and this recession has made it so even fewer of our children can live where they grew up. Rural areas all over the country need to be reinvigorated. I will work with Members of Congress who represent similar districts to make rural areas strong again."
In case you weren't around for the AL-03 contest in 2008, Josh Segall is a young lawyer from Montgomery, Alabama who came out of nowhere and almost picked off a sitting Congressman -- well, Rogers isn't much of a Congressman, but he still enjoys the perks of incumbency -- with a well executed grassroots campaign.
By my count, Segall is getting into the race about 10 months earlier than he did in the 2008 cycle. Coupled with his already good name recognition in the district, that extra time should position him very well to finish the job against Rogers in 2010. Per opensecrets.org, Segall raised right at a million dollars in the 2008 cycle compared to Rogers'$1.4 million and he garnered almost 47% of the vote. He even outraised Rogers for a couple of reporting periods and forced Rogers to outspend him two to one -- that's a perk of incumbency, for sure. It was a stunning effort considering that Segall started with almost zero name recognition, no money and never had substantive support from the DCCC because they were busy spending a million or so in AL-02 and AL-05. Given the conservative voting record of those Blue Dogs they shouldn't need a dime of DCCC money to keep their seats next year no matter how right leaning their districts are. The time is ripe for the DCCC to target Rogers' district the way they targeted AL-02 and AL-05 last cycle and Segall is the perfect candidate to do the job in this East Alabama district.
Welcome back to the fray, Josh! May the best man win. Josh Segall's ActBlue page is here.