Ellington, Holloway Round Out Challengers In First District Congressional Race

Recently, Talk Business picked up interviews from our newest content partner, KASU-FM 91.9, of First District Democrats Clark Hall and Gary Latanich.

Our Talk Business radio program airs on Saturdays at noon on KASU, the Jonesboro NPR affiliate. Jonathan Reaves with KASU interviews two new challengers seeking to take on incumbent Republican Cong. Rick Crawford: Democrat Scott Ellington and Green Party candidate Jacob Holloway.

Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ellington (D-Jonesboro)
The third Democrat in the race is Jonesboro Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ellington, who entered the Democratic primary in the waning hours of the filing period.

Ellington rose quickly to prominence for his role in the West Memphis 3 decision, which led to the release of the 3 convicted murderers to time served. He’s a native of northeast Arkansas and a graduate of Arkansas State University and the UALR School of Law. Ellington, who considers himself a political outsider, says he doesn’t like the way partisan politics has played out in the last several years. It’s created a stalemate for getting any meaningful legislation passed, he contends.

On jobs:  “The thing about getting people back to work is a number one priority is keeping the jobs we have right now. That’s the immediate priority for me. In the first district, I would see myself almost as a federal member of the chamber of commerce — to go out and solicit industry to come to the First District.  We have 2 large airfields within an hour driving distance of where we’re sitting here in Jonesboro. We have other areas throughout this district where it should be very, very appealing to industry to come to Arkansas and the First District. I would work toward building infrastructure in the First District, work toward working  with our development entities throughout – local and federal development entities – to try to bring funding to the First District so that we could put people to work.”

Ellington offers more on jobs and on his political philosophy and you can listen to more at this link.

Jacob Holloway
There is also a Green Party candidate planning a challenge for the seat. Jacob Holloway discusses his candidacy with Reaves.

Holloway, a graduate student at Arkansas State University who is studying agricultural science and commodities markets, is a former candidate for the Jonesboro City Council. He said he had more interest in national policy issues and was “extremely frustrated” with the political system where he sees little room for new ideas. Holloway is not accepting any PAC money or committing to any special interest groups, positions he feels will make him more independent and responsive to individual voters.

On the economy: “I think the number one problem is we don’t have a debt issue in the United States.  The problem is we’re talking about austerity measures when our economy is actually shrinking. Basic macroeconomics, government spending makes up a whole quarter of your economy and what happens when you shrink the government’s ability to be able to influence the economy you’re going to hurt the economy more. This is not a time for austerity.

“We have solutions to be able to use things like alternative energy, rebuilding our power grid, switching over to a viable fuel system that isn’t based on fossil fuels — things that can rejuvenate our economy, and that’s going to come through Congress. That’s actually going to come through government spending. These are policies we’re going to have to decide we want to take on. Otherwise, yeah, the debt would be a problem.

“I think the biggest problem with the debt is military spending. The amount the United States spends in military spending is two times over what the whole world spends plus some and it’s absolutely ridiculous. We’ve got Osama Bin Laden, the war on terrorism should be ramping down, but our leaders in Washington, D.C. are going around belligerently threatening to attack other countries and they’re not threatening to cut the military spending one bit. So how can we spend money on infrastructure and making sure people have health care when all the money goes to the military?”

You can listen to more of Holloway’s interview here.