According to The Virginian-Pilot, 2nd Congressional Rep. Glenn Nye has officially drawn another challenger: Scott Rigell.
Rigell, 49, shipped his paperwork to the Federal Election Commission on Monday. He said he is running to help Republicans regain control of Congress and restore fiscal discipline.
Already announced is former Virginia Beach Republican Party chair Chuck Smith. The article mentions several other possible contenders. Rigell, though, has something they don’t: the support of former Rep. Thelma Drake.
That the Republicans have been eyeing this seat is no surprise. Most watch lists have the seat in the vulnerable category, along with that of another 2008 Democratic pickup, Rep. Tom Perriello in the 5th District.
The Nye win in 2008 was a surprise to many. Although Nye received 400 fewer votes than the winning Obama/Biden ticket, Drake ran a little over 8,200 votes behind McCain/Palin. It is the crossover vote that helped to propel Nye into office ~ and the vote he seeks to maintain, if his recent voting record is any indication. Can Rigell appeal not only to the Republicans in this district but also to those in the middle?
Guess we’ll find out soon enough. But I’m hoping this campaign takes a bit of a backseat between now and November. Getting people to focus on this year’s races is more important right now.
UPDATE: The Hill has this story as well and it appears that Rigell has the support of the NRCC.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
After eight years of the Bush regime, Americans should have learned NEVER to turn over the control of our national government to the Republicans, ever again! While Virginians should surely consider supporting a Republican on an individual basis, (like Virgil Goode in the Fifth District, whose candor is globally known) the Republican leadership have proved that they are neither competent to lead, nor inclined to protect our LIBERTY.
This fellow, Mr. Rigell, may be a solid candidate, but for anyone who loves liberty and has watched Mr. Nye, so far, it would be foolish to replace a Representative with Mr. Nye’s penchant for dealing with each issue in an independent and candid fashion, like he does.
As someone who has supported both Republican and Democratic candidates of merit, I see Mr. Nye as the sort of Representative who truly reflects the views of his constituents in a very Virginia way, where sometimes his votes are supported by the Right and other times by the Left. So far, he seems to exercise good judgment and he pays attention to the Constitution, unlike Bush and his lackeys.
Quite a screed from a leftist. Let’s see — gun rights, no; freedom of religion, no; freedom of speech, no; adhering to the limited, enumerated powers of Congress, no; a president who refuses to prove he is constitutionally eligible, yes.
C’mon AEM, enough with the birth certificate silliness.
All he has to do is release the long form. Why won’t he? Why won’t he release his medical records or his school records, either?
What, you need to know how much he weighed at birth? Read this:
http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/born_in_the_usa.html
Government in the hands of any one party is a horrible thing, especially the democrats. Think about it democracy was designed to be the most inefficient form of government. Dare you argue that? Now how can you say government can efficiently dole out money and perform services better than the private sector? You can’t. The Republican leadership sucks, clearly, but the democratic ideology is quite backwards. Do you want more government control and less personal freedom? All these new government programs Obama wants are pointless, if he and others in government positions had the balls to hold people accountable through existing laws then he wouldn’t need to pass any legislation. Take this for example, someone hypothetically wants to pass a law against beating seniors, sounds great, except beating anyone is assault and can be prosecuted as such, so why need another law? We have laws on the books to do most everything the democrats want to do, they just want to make more government that will yet again not administer them properly. We need better people in office, not more redundant laws on the books.
VB Dems has a fun post about Rep. Nye and the Cap & Trade bill. Even by the standards of Congress, he’s exceptionally weaselly on this issue.
http://www.vbdems.org/diary/3062/nye-two-faces-on-aces
I wonder if these folks think these things over before they jump into politics? Do you think Scott Rigell is really trying to offend half his customer base in the car business? I’ll never by a Freedom car ever again…
Go figure.
Has Town Bank crashed because more 50% of Virginia Beach voted against its president?
Do Republicans still use Heinz Ketchup?
Do you have a clue what your talking about?
As a matter of fact, yes I do. Thanks for asking.
Your a Republican that uses Heinz ketchup? Awesome, thanks for proving my point.
Mr. Rigell is in the car business and has been rewarded for his Obama campaign contribution in the form of the Democrat “Cash for Clunkers” program. In the interest of transparency, will he release the details of what his business has received from the program? Apparently we can’t get the details from the administration:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D99S6M481&show_article=1