Bro. Nathan Bennett-Fleming is a 25-year-old dynamo. The '07 Morehouse grad who served as Vice Basileus of Psi Chapter at Morehouse College is a candidate for graduation from the joint Juris Doctor/Master of Public Policy program at Boalt Hall (UC-Berkeley) Law School and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, where he was on a full tuition scholarship. He has now set his sight on becoming D.C.'s 'Shadow' Representative. He is an emerging leader.
25-Year-Old Wants To Bring D.C.’s Shadow Rep Seat Into The Spotlight
Posted on August 10, 2010 by Teke Wiggin
A dentist in his white lab coat stands transfixed, his blue mask hanging delicately by one ear pushed down below his chin. His patients, crowded into the small waiting room, also stare intently. Their object of interest: a young bespectacled man in a black suit with a blue tie and bright red button pinned to his lapel.
“That’s why I decided to run for this office,” the man says gesticulating as he locks eyes with each customer, “because I’m young, because I have energy, because I have supporters all across the city. I felt that if I cared about it we could make more people care about it across the country.”
The patients and dentist nod their heads in approval, evidently charmed by the man’s words despite his unsolicited presence.
“Well, you’ve got my vote,” the dentist says decisively. Another woman grunts in agreement.
The man is 25-year-old Nate Bennett-Fleming, and what he cares about is D.C. statehood. A Harvard Kennedy School of Government student, Bennet-Fleming is hankering after D.C.’s shadow rep seat, a little-known office dedicated to D.C. states rights advocacy.
D.C.’s license plate slogan, “Taxation without Representation,” reminds us all that The District of Columbia is a territory distinct from all others on the U.S mainland for a simple reason: it does not get any votes in Congress.
“You wonder why in the shadows of the capital we have so many people living in political dysfunction,” Fleming says. “We’re legally ignored by the nation’s representatives.”
But there is a great opportunity at hand, the candidate says. Today’s Democrat-controlled Congress makes it a better time than ever for D.C. to clinch its 200-year-old goal, according to this political novice.
The city just needs one thing to go about doing that, he says: him.
Earlier that day, Fleming sat down with us in his campaign office, a block down from North Capital and New York Avenue, where police had just dispersed a gaggle of bums. The cluttered box of a room, wallpapered by ward maps, packed with staff, and furnished almost exclusively by fold-out chairs, was decidedly modest.
But that certainly hasn’t held back the young candidate’s campaign: so far his team has raised over $17,000, according to Fleming’s Chief of Staff Christopher Hollins, an old Morehouse frat buddy turned Yale law student. Compare that to the $628 in campaign funds incumbent Mike Pannetta reported to the Office of Campaign Finance on July 1st, and you start to get an idea of how big that number really is.
A self-described “native Washingtonian from the wrong side of the tracks,” the 25-year-old says “reading was the bridge” that got him from the slums of Southeast to where he is today, taking him first to Morehouse College in Georgia “to follow in the footsteps of MLK [Martin Luther King Jr.]” (Morehouse was MLK’s alma mater) and then onto UC-Berkeley Law and the Harvard Kennedy School of Leadership where he currently pursues a law and master’s degree respectively.
Since his late teens and throughout college, Fleming has immersed himself in politics, working on various campaigns and projects, including John Kerry’s 2004 presidential run.
Fleming thinks he has what it takes to oust incumbent Mike Pannetta because he is young, a local (Pannetta was born in CT.), and a coalition builder. He has endorsements to show for that last qualification.
Fleming has clinched official support from the Gertrude Stein Club, D.C. Latino PAC, and Ward 8 democrats.
He is especially proud of the Stein endorsement, calling it “the prized D.C. endorsement” and claiming it showcases his ability to rally disparate groups behind a single cause.
Ward 8, which is his home community, is mostly opposed to gay marriage.
Should Fleming win office, the candidate plans to implement ambitious strategies, some of which verge on quixotic. He wants to organize D.C. citizens to engage in direct action protests, ramp up outreach to members of Congress and public policy firms, and even “build a nationwide movement.”
“To that end, I think we have to take a page out of the civil rights playbook,” he says. “We need to enlist them [non-D.C. residents] on our behalf. Right now this issue is not in the mainstream.”
Fleming intends to kick-start this movement on August 15th by launching a month-long campaign called “30 Days for D.C. Statehood,” in which the candidate will host “community activities to get more D.C. citizens fired up about statehood.” The highlight of this initiative will be a trip to the Lincoln Memorial on August 28th, the day that Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I have a dream” speech and also when conservative pundit Glenn Beck intends to address tea-partiers across the nation.
“I want to make sure all the views are heard that day. I want to make sure our message isn’t ignored,” he says.
Fleming and his team walk up a pocked neighborhood street away from the dentist office after his warmly-received pitch. They scan houses’ lawns for activity, looking for the most promising residences to canvas.
Suddenly, the sound of a door slamming issues forth and a voice calls out behind them. Fleming turns to find the dentist standing on the street in his lab coat. His mask is now pulled fully back behind his neck. He looks quizzically at the 25-year-old.
“So how do I make a donation?” he asks.
http://www.natefordc.com/
http://blogs.wamu.org/the-front-burn...ight/#more-934
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...ehood-efforts/
http://www.steindemocrats.org/Nate%2...ming%20Bio.pdf
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