20 August 2007

There are humble folks in the world, folks who are truly committed to creating empowerment opportunities for real people. It’s rare, however, to find someone so grounded that they can work in the White House, throw names around that most of us would gush at, and still, still maintain a deep sense of humility.

Starting his career out of a desire not to be penned into a boring cubicle with gray walls, Maine's Democratic National Committeeman, Sam Spencer, has journeyed from Standish to the White House and then onto the quaint neighborhood of Portland's West End. Regardless of which stops he made along the way, the walls were hardly ever gray.

“I graduated from college and I wasn’t ready to go work in a cubicle. Most of my classmates were getting jobs on Wall Street and in consulting. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I knew I didn’t want to do that,” says Sam. “It was 1996 and I graduated that summer. President Clinton was running for re-election and I knew someone on the campaign. I got a job doing advance work on Clinton’s campaign going around the country for a while and running his motorcades. And then, I ended up in
the White House when he was elected.”

For Sam, it was a bit of a coming home. At 16, he served as a Senate page and his grandfather, a Republican, served as the mayor of DC many years before. While the political landscape has most assuredly changed repeatedly throughout the short history of the US, there are certain parts of the District that have served as inspirations to countless folks committed to serving the public.

“I really liked to run along the mall,” says Sam. “When I was a page, I loved to run from the capital to the Washington Memorial to the Lincoln and then over the bridge to the Jefferson Memorial. It was really inspiring. I love DC.”

As fate would have it, or in this case the courts, Sam’s presence in DC the second time around would
not be as long as most of us Democrats would have hoped. Three people were responsible for managing Al Gore's pre-election transition planning and hires for the prospective new vadministration, one of the most critical responsibilities for an incoming president. Sam was one of them.

“All the files for Gore’s transition are sitting in some boxes on Pine Street,” he laughs, a bit ironically.
But for all the disappointment we all felt in 2000, Sam appears to be doing fine nestled into his place
on the West End of Portland.

“I left Maine and I always knew I’d come back,” says Sam. “I love the people, I love Portland and I
love the whole state. It was always my intention to come back and contribute to the state.”

“Now I have my own company [as a real estate developer] and I’m trying to do what could be a
large-scale redevelopment of the mills in Biddeford,” he says. “It’s quite an incredible location, right
along the Saco River.”

But even as the real estate bug has bitten Sam, he maintains a strong passion for politics. Committed
to engaging real people in the Democratic Party, Sam reaches beyond the inner circle of the party to
bring new perspectives and fresh insight to the national level.

His personal mission is to reach out to the very real people who are affected by the decisions made
countless miles from where his people cast their vote. “Democrats are the party of the people," he
says, "the party that cares about everyday Americans, cares about the issues that I care about like
health care, the environment and a strong middle class."

“When I first got to the Democratic National Committee, I asked who I should vote for as Chairman
of the Party. A lot of insiders were upset that I voted for Howard Dean, but the rank-and-file members
were overwhelmingly in favor of him,” says Sam. “And that’s how I voted. I try to do it for the benefit
of the broader group and not for a small group of insiders. I hope that makes me different from the
rest of the insiders around the country.”

For such a controversial decision, popular sentiment clearly paved the way for the current successes of
the Democratic Party. Deans’ 50 State Strategy has since created investments in the roots of the party,
and not just the green grass, the affects of which has pushed back against the tidal wave of hipocrasy.

It is precisely this type of populist sentiment that often forces would-be average Joes and Janes into
the spotlight of elected office. In fact, such respected Dems as Edmund Muskie and Tom Allen have
both served as Committeeman begging the question of Sam’s future aspirations. “I love being the
Democratic National Committeeman because it allows me to be in politics on a part-time basis and be
involved,” says Sam. “I love being in business and will probably want to stay there.”

Then again, he's only thirty-four...

~ MissDem