Smith will run for U.S. Congress

Published Sunday, January 20, 2008

By Staff

Fort Worth real estate broker and former television and newspaper reporter Tracey Smith will run for the congressional seat currently held by Kay Granger.

Smith, a Democrat, said while he had considered running to represent the 12th District of Texas in the U.S. Congress before, the timing hadn't been right. That was before the Democratic congressional majority.

"I'm not running because I'm a Democrat," Smith said during his announcement last week. "I care about the issues Democrats are really trying to push."

In a press release, Smith said he wants to bring troops home from Iraq.

"It's time to let the Iraqis learn how to get along and run their own country," he stated in the release. "The war is over. We won. We should bring some of our soldiers home and send others to Afghanistan to finish the war there. A vote to continue the war in Iraq is a vote to kill two soldiers per day. Meanwhile, we have ignored Afghanistan and the Taliban is regaining footholds there. It is the same as if the Nazis had returned to power in some areas of Germany three years after World War II ended."

He also criticized congressional Republicans for not supporting the SCHIP program, "denying health insurance coverage to an additional 700,000 children," he said in his release.

Smith said Republican-controlled government has also "caused our national deficit to explode with an enormous increase in government expenditures and unnecessary tax cuts."

If elected, Smith said he would like to work with both Democrats and Republicans alike to end the "polarization" that exists in politics today.

Smith worked as a reporter for The Dallas Times Herald in the early 1970s and for KDFW-TV, Channel 4, as a Fort Worth reporter in the late 1970s.

The 12 Congressional District includes northern and western Tarrant County and all of Parker and Wise counties.

Granger, a Republican, has represented the 12th Congressional District since 1996. She serves on the Appropriations Committee and serves on the Energy and Water Development, Homeland Security and Military Construction/Veterans Affairs Appropriations subcommittees. She previously served as mayor of Fort Worth.