Richard Becker – How I Got Bit by the Political Bug

I first entered politics in 2004 at the age of 17, going door-to-door in my home county of Hamilton County, Indiana for Gov. Joe Kernan and the Kerry-Edwards campaign.  I can recall meeting with an organizer at a coffeeshop with a high school friend of mine and being handed a packet of names, a bundle of brochures, and a Joe Kernan for Governor lapel sticker.  Out we went, knocking on door after door in the neighborhoods of Noblesville, the county courthouse’s majestic clock tower looming in the background.  Having finally exhausted our packets after several hours, we returned to Democratic headquarters where we were greeted by a bevy of seasoned local Democratic activists (read: cute, earnest, little old ladies).

What ensued was a full twenty minutes of gushing and doting that centered on one theme: how precious of you two to be volunteering for a political campaign when you can’t even vote yourselves!  They were enamored with us, and we with the compliments.  That was the day I decided that an activity that felt this good had to be something I pursued in some more substantive way moving forward, which brings us to the University of Kentucky.

In my first semester as a college freshman, I attended a campus event at which student organizations could promote themselves and happened upon the table for the UK College Democrats.  Intrigued, I got to talking to several of their members and agreed to attend their first meeting, which, like any well-planned first semester meeting featured free pizza and soda.  I became a regular at these meetings over the coming weeks and when a position opened up at the end of the semester for the chapter treasurer, I was nominated and unanimously elected to the position.  I served as the treasurer for some three months before our president announced she would not be running.  All heads in the room turned to me and I was once again nominated and unanimously elected president of the chapter, the youngest such president in chapter history.  While I was president of the UK chapter, we volunteered for John Yarmuth’s winning 2006 congressional campaign as well as for the campaign of Ken Lucas in northern Kentucky’s 4th district.  It was while working on the latter campaign that I first met a man who would come to play a pivotal role in my development as a professional political staffer.  
His name was Jon Wright, from Paducah, KY and he was a recent law school graduate.  I spoke with him on the phone several times leading up to the weekend when about two dozen of our UK members rode with me up to the 4th district to volunteer.  Seeing him in person, I realized that Jon was truly a ball of energy, bouncing from person to person, task to task, stopping only long enough to answer a phone or check a call script before resuming his frenzied pace.  We kept in touch over the years, which was a good thing, because it would be a call from him in June of 2008 that would change the path of my career forever.

“Hey buddy, how would you like to work for the next president of the United States?”  It was Jon Wright calling, and I had one leg in and one leg out of tuxedo pants as I readied myself for work at a local hotel.  I managed a labored swallow.  

“Um, excuse me?” I croaked.

“Look man, don’t have much time here.  You in school this fall?”

“Uh, yeah, I am.  Of course.  Why?”

“You’re taking a semester off.  The Obama campaign is hiring field organizers in Ohio and you need to be one of them.  Take all the time you need to think about it and then call me back in two hours.”

All the time I need?  “Thanks for thinking of me Jon, but, wait–”

“Gotta run, talk soon.”  He hung up.

My head was spinning.  I didn’t know the first thing about being an organizer on a presidential campaign outside of what I had witnessed as a volunteer over the past three years.  And why me?  What had Jon seen in me that inspired him to call me?  I never did find out.  

All I know is that two weeks later, I had quit my job at the hotel and was driving my packed-to-the-brim Ford Taurus into Chillicothe, OH, with nothing but a scrap of paper with an address on it to get me started.  Little did I know that I was about to begin the wildest ride of my life.

 
The story of my four months working for the Obama-Biden campaign in Ohio could fill the pages of a book, so I’ll spare RP’s readers the full treatment.  What I will say is that this, my first paid job as an organizer, revealed to me both the best and brightest parts of politics, as well as its dark, seedy underworld.  Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, more than any other campaign in history, had at its heart a program of real, on-the-ground, person-to-person community organizing.  The model we implemented across Ohio and across the country brought out the best in people, showing them what they were capable of accomplishing if they came together around a common cause and worked hard to meet their goals.

We field organizers were to develop a team of what the campaign called “Neighborhood Team Leaders,” who were themselves responsible for building a team of “Neighborhood Team Members,” all of whom had the unique task of locally disseminating the message of the Obama campaign and fighting back against the daily onslaught of lies and distortions the right hurled at Obama.  Our mantra was to “organize yourself out of a job,” with the idea being that if you established strong enough teams, your work was naturally done for you, with you merely watching from above and making broad strategic decisions based on reports from your team leaders and feedback from your own superiors.

The reason I mention this process is that it, more than anything else during those four months, inspired me to pursue some sort of a career in public service.  Seeing out-of-work people, many of whom were for the first time in their life on some form of government assistance, their home languishing in foreclosure proceedings, their children either hungry or too poor to attend college when they reached eighteen–seeing these people coming in day after day to our campaign headquarters to be the face of the Obama campaign in their community in spite of all of their own personal daily hardships, still moves me.  The people I worked with on that campaign threw everything they had into a campaign they believed in.  Did they cast unrealistic expectations onto Barack Obama?  Yes.  But many of them had never had any opinions whatsoever on politics before this campaign came along, and 2008 inspired them to get involved in a way they never had before, and on a scale this country had never before seen.

On Election Day, I was awakened along with all of the other field organizers across Ohio at 4:30am by a phone call.  On the other end of the line was the smooth southern drawl of William Jefferson Clinton exhorting the Ohio staff to wake up and get to work.  Some fifteen hours later, when polls had closed and every Democrat in the county had gathered at a local union hall to watch the returns, I could barely remain standing.  Every fiber in my being was so thoroughly exhausted that I felt I might collapse.  But then, as I stood near the refreshment table chatting with a supporter, I noticed a hush fall over the hundreds of people in the room.  On the large screen before us stood a map of the state of Ohio.  My eyes nervously darted around the room, watching as fingers crossed, hands clenched, and lips pursed.

“NBC is calling the Buckeye State, with its twenty electoral votes, for Illinois Senator Barack Obama.”  

For a split second, it was as if the world had stopped.  Then came an eruption of screams, cheers, applause, laughter, and the sound of champagne bottles popping.  I physically spun, taking in the celebration spontaneously unfolding around me.  Young and old, black and white, well-to-do and poor filled that union hall.  And every one of them was laughing, crying, hollering, hugging, kissing, dancing, and singing praise.  I received several claps on the shoulder and congratulations.  I made my way around the room, shaking hands and thanking our volunteers and supporters.

Once home, I poured myself a vodka and tonic from my host family’s stash and sat down in a recliner in front of the TV in the living room.  Kevin and Paul, the couple who had so graciously hosted me for those long months, joined me.  I lit a cigarette and flipped on the television.  As the screen became clear, the image of the president-elect and his family came into view.  They had just emerged before a capacity crowd in Chicago’s Grant Park and were waving to the assembled faithful.

Kevin turned to me and patted my leg.  “We’ve done a good thing, Richard.”

“I know, Kev,” I said.  “I know.”

*This is the first in a series of articles on one Millennial’s speedy entrance into politics and his just-as-speedy exit some five years later.