Keown to Bishop: 'The eviction notice is in the mail'

By CHUCK WILLIAMS

Columbus Ledger-Enquirer

ALBANY, Ga. — Twice during Thursday night’s final debate with Republican challenger Mike Keown, Democratic Congressman Sanford Bishop alluded to his service.

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AP Photo/The Albany Herald, Joe Bellacomo Rep. Sanford Bishop is a nine-term U.S. lawmaker representing a district that covers all or parts of 32 counties south from South Columbus to the Florida line and west from the Alabama line to Valdosta.

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AP Photo/The Albany Herald, Joe Bellacomo Republican Mike Keown, a Georgia state representative from Thomas County who started the race 15 months ago as an underfunded candidate, has made a strong run at incumbent U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop in the 2nd District.

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“Service is the rent we pay for the space we occupy on this earth,” Bishop said.

Five days before the General Election and with polls showing Keown engaging the nine-term representative in a close battle, the South Georgia Baptist minister turned the phrase on Bishop.

“The majority of the people in the 2nd Congressional District believe the rent is overdue,” Keown said to a partisan Albany Municipal Auditorium crowd that clearly favored him. “The eviction notice is in the mail and you will get it on Tuesday.”

Bishop took exception with Keown’s political record.

“He has no record of accomplishment,” Bishop responded. “No marker of service.”

Keown, a Georgia state representative from Thomas County who started the race 15 months ago as an underfunded candidate, has made a strong run at Bishop in the 2nd District, which covers all or parts of 32 counties south from South Columbus to the Florida line and west from the Alabama line to Valdosta.

More than 300 people attended the debate, many of them wearing T-shirts and buttons indicating which candidate they favored. When the men made their points, people cheered and jeered.

Bishop hit Keown for a mistake on the Republican’s campaign website. Keown claimed he had been mayor of the Thomas County town of Coolidge for four years in the late 1980s.

“I was mayor for 33 months,” Keown explained, saying he started and finished the four-year term, taking a break in the middle. He said while mayor he resigned to take a job 60 miles away in Valdosta, then returned about a year later to re-run for the seat he abandoned. He was elected and finished out the term.

Bishop responded by saying he had never resigned office during his political career.

“They have searched over and over trying to find stuff on me,” Keown said. “They have done Open Records requests on my wife, my kids — I am wondering when they are going to get to my grandkids — and that is all they got.”

After the debate, Bishop said his campaign has not been filing Georgia Open Records Act requests for information on Keown.

Keown continued to swing at Bishop about issues that have arisen with the Muscogee County Junior Marshal’s Program and the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation scholarship program. Bishop’s stepdaughter and her husband worked for the Junior Marshal Program, which was funded in part by federal earmarks secured by the congressman. Bishop’s family also benefitted from the scholarship program,

“I would never intentionally abuse my public trust,” Bishop said. “I have never intentionally done that.”

Keown also continued to question Bishop’s vote for President Obama’s health-care plan and the federal stimulus package.

Bishop said if he had his way, the stimulus package would have included gift cards that would could not be saved but would be required to be spent.

“It would have jolted the economy,” Bishop said.