Interview With Rob Maness, Republican Candidate From Louisiana For U.S. Senate

Mandeville, LA – Exclusive Transcript – The next candidate I’m going to introduce you to is one of us, a [r]epublican.  He is a veteran of the Air Force and currently works in the private sector.  He lives near yours truly.  He and I are friends.  We’re about to find out who candidate number two is to take down and hopefully replace Senator Mary Landrieu.  I’d like to introduce the audience to my friend Rob Maness.  Check out today’s transcript for the rest…

 

Press release after transcript.

Begin Mike Church Show Transcript

Mike:  Earlier today I told you we would have a big announcement here.  We have the second candidate — when we’re concluded here there will now be two candidates that have announced to run against Senator Mary Landrieu here in Louisiana.  The next candidate I’m going to introduce you to is one of us, a [r]epublican.  He is a veteran of the Air Force and currently works in the private sector.  He lives near yours truly.  He and I are friends.  I asked him, when he was going to make his announcement: Hey, man, you want to make it on the show.  He said absolutely, so here we are on the 13^th of May 2013.  We’re about to find out who candidate number two is to take down and hopefully replace Senator Mary Landrieu.  I’d like to introduce the audience to my friend Rob Maness.  Rob, congratulations on the big announcement.  How you, big guy?

Rob Maness:  Thanks, Mike.  I appreciate you having me on, my friend.  We’re doing great out here in Madisonville.  It’s a beautiful day.  How are you doing?

Mike:  It is a beautiful day.  You and Dr. Bill Cassidy are now in the ring against Mary Landrieu.  I assume then, now that you’ve announced, you’ll basically be campaigning against Cassidy.  It’ll be you and Cassidy if not someone else as well.  What can you tell the folks about Rob Maness for United States Senate?

Maness:  Let me tell you why my wife and I and my family have been talking about this for the last few months, and why we made the decision to go ahead and announce today my candidacy as a constitutional conservative Republican candidate for the Senate seat against Mary Landrieu.  I suited up in uniform for 32 years in the military.  I lived by an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.  While I was doing that mission and fulfilling that oath, my peers and I looked out for America and guarded us against America’s enemies, while behind us the folks in the political class were not living up to their end of the bargain and supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States.  I think you see evidence of that today.  You were just talking about one of those issues earlier and the breaking news about the IRS looking closely at conservative organizations.  It’s just more evidence that the big government concept is not the right way to go for the American people or the people of Louisiana.  We’ve got to have men and women in Congress who are going to legislate from a set of principles, not from public opinion polls.  I’m going to look at every piece of legislation through the lens of the Constitution first before I agree to support it.

Mike:  Fantastic.

Maness:  It’s going to be a different kind of campaign.  It’s going to be a grassroots effort.  I don’t have the machine.  We’re going to be out in the state.  You’re going to see me and my family in your towns over the next 18 months.  We’re going to need everybody’s help.  We’re up on the web at RobManess.com.  We’re on Facebook at RobManessForSenate2014.  We’re up on Twitter @RobManess.  There’s an opportunity to donate your time, your volunteer work, or any funds you have available.  I understand the economy is tight.  If everybody can pull together from a grassroots level, we can take this to a victory.

Mike:  It could be really great for the state.   Having me you, Rob, I also know a little bit of history.  You come from a long line of Americans that have served.  Do you want to tell the story that you told me about the Revolutionary War Maness?

Maness:  Sure, I appreciate that, Mike.  I’m the eighth generation of American service member on my dad’s side of the family, from the Maness family.  Our first Maness that was born in the country, then known as the colonies, his name was William Maness.  In 1775, he and only five other men walked off of Bear Mountain in what was then North Carolina Territory, to volunteer for the Continental Army.  There were only five out of the entire county.  They stood up for liberty and the concepts of natural law and the creator’s law, the right to life, to pursue happiness.  We can’t let them down, or the generations that have followed them.

Mike:  Eight generations, that’s quite a pedigree.  Rob Maness is announcing his candidacy for United States Senate today.  Are we going to see a Rob Maness bus?  Are you going to be pulling a trailer around?  How are you going to be traveling about the state to campaign and go out and meet the folks of Louisiana, talk to them about republicanism and the Constitution?

Maness:  It’s a Rob Maness pickup truck.

Mike:  I like it.

Maness:  I thought about the bus, but the pickup truck is easier to get around and get the team out in all the areas of Louisiana to talk to the people at the grassroots level to get their support and convince them that I’m the right man to serve the State of Louisiana in Congress in the United States Senate.

Mike:  Rob also, not only does he have a military background but he’s currently working in the private sector.  At least he has some experience handling money and seeing things like payrolls met and businesses actually operating, struggling mightily against government regulation and seeing the ill effects of that.  Is that going to be part of your campaign as well?

Maness:  Absolutely.  Energy independence is a key issue for the State of Louisiana.  Oil and gas production is vital to our state and to our nation.  The oil and gas industry is a $70-billion-a-year industry in Louisiana and the Gulf that employs over 300,000 hardworking men and women.  Louisiana is first in the nation in crude oil production.  That includes all the activity on land and out in the Gulf.  Senator Landrieu, she was elected in 1997 for the first time, but it’s only recently that she’s started trying to get Louisiana’s fair share of our offshore oil and gas royalties.  I don’t understand why she wasn’t fighting for Louisiana’s fair share for the past 16 years.  I’ll fight for Louisiana from day one.  As a matter of fact, I feel that I’ve been fighting for it since I came home back here after I retired from the Air Force.  We’ll get our fair share of offshore oil and gas royalties.  We also need to expand drilling on federal land so we can truly become the energy independent stop and stop sending billions of dollars to countries that hate America and what we stand for.

Mike:  Rob Maness has announced his candidacy for United States Senate.  You can find him on the internet at RobManess.com, Twitter @RobManess, and on Facebook RobManessSenate2014.  Time is going to run a little short, so just one thing that I think most Louisianans who are listening to this show are concerned about.  As you point out, Senator Landrieu has not been a proponent of this until very recently.  Senator Vitter and your opponent to his credit, Representative Cassidy, have got an issue that you and I talked about.  You were all animated about fighting for a restoration of our submerged lands.  It’s not just the royalty off the oil and gas.  It’s the fact that the feds, in the 1960s, basically told us: You guys don’t own that property three leagues out into the Gulf anymore, sorry.  That’s kind of ours.  In your campaigning and if elected to the Senate, what would your take be on that?

Maness:  I wholly support Senator Vitter’s effort.  The coastal restoration is key to protection from the forces or hurricanes.  Louisianans deserve to have that opportunity to control that area and be free to use that, fish hatcheries out there for commercial and for recreational use.  I fully support that.

Mike:  Fantastic.  We’ll be hearing an awful lot, I’m sure.  It’s 18 months away.  You’re getting started at the right time.  It’s RobManess.com  Rob is running for United States Senate.  He will be campaigning in Republican primaries then hopefully, if he’s victorious, it will be Rob versus Senator Landrieu in November of 2014.  I wish you the very best of luck, my friend.  We’ll certainly stay in touch.  Good luck with the grassroots campaigning effort.  I think just the fact that you’re actually running for the Senate is admirable, and that you’re doing it this early on shows your dedication to it and your level of enthusiasm.  We certainly wish you well.

Maness:  Thanks, Mike.  Louisiana and America deserve extra effort when it comes to their citizens.  I’m just a citizen that wants to get the political atmosphere back on the right track so that we have an America that is limited government, strong, sets a great example for freedom all around the world.  I hope to get you out in the pickup truck in some of these small towns and parishes around the state over the next 18 months.  You can join me.

Mike:  You can count on it, brother.  That’s Rob Maness for U.S. Senate in the State of Louisiana.  Rob, we’ll talk soon.  Godspeed.

Maness:  Thanks a lot, god bless.

Mike:  There you go, folks.  We have a brand new Senate candidate to run against Mary Landrieu.  I think Mary Landrieu is in trouble this time.  She has not had that kind of opposition in the two times she has defended her, it’s not her seat, it’s our seat, but that particular seat in the United States Senate.  Representative Cassidy is a strong contender, as is Rob.  I think because of Rob’s experience in the Air Force, he brings 30 years of that experience to the table.  It’s going to be a great race.

End Mike Church Show Transcript

 

Rob Maness to run for U.S. Senate in Louisiana

Colonel Rob Maness (USAF, Ret.) today released the following statement announcing his candidacy for the United States Senate seat currently held by Mary Landrieu (D-LA).

“When I was 17, I enlisted in the United States Air Force and swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Although it’s been more than 35 years, that oath is as sacred to me as the day that I swore it.

“Since my retirement from the Air Force in 2011, I’ve seen first-hand how the Obama Administration – along with our current Senator Mary Landrieu – are hurting our economy and our freedom with unconstitutional big-government schemes like ObamaCare,” said Rob.

“That’s why today – after prayerful consideration with my wife Candy – I am announcing my candidacy to be Louisiana’s next United States Senator.

“I have a deep passion to restore America to the rock-solid foundation of the Constitution and the conservative values that made it so great. I know without a shadow of a doubt, that’s what it will take to get us back to prosperity at home and leadership abroad.

“Our state deserves a Senator that will side with the interests of Louisianans, not collude with the Washington politicians to give them more control over our lives.”

Rob, a 32-year veteran of the Air force serving both in the field as a combat commander and back at home as an operations officer in the Pentagon and as one of the first staff members at Air Force Global Strike Command in Bossier City Louisiana, is currently the director of a large utility and the owner of a third-generation family farm with his wife, Candy.

Rob is also a founding Board member at NOLA Patriots, Inc., a veteran’s advocacy group committed to preventing veteran suicides and ensuring military families have equal access to benefits.  He has served on the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce and Hispano Chamber of Commerce boards of directors. As President of his local chapter of the Military Officer’s Association of America, he created an annual scholarship fund for graduating high school students.

Rob completed his undergraduate degrees while attending night school at the University of Tampa and holds Masters degrees from Harvard University’s Kennedy School, the Air Command and Staff College, and the US College of Naval Warfare.

Rob and Candy have five children, including two sons serving in the military (one active US Navy, one US Army guardsman), and two grandchildren. They are members of the First Baptist Church, Covington Louisiana.

Website: RobManess.com

Facebook: facebook.com/LouisianaSenateVet

Twitter: twitter.com/robmaness