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Jim Neal Out for NC Senate Seat

North Carolina businessman Jim Neal is taking on Republican incumbent Elizabeth Dole for U.S. Senate, and as of this weekend, he’s taking on homophobia as well. In an online discussion Saturday on BlueNC.com, Neal responded to a comment that he is rumored to be gay by saying, “I am indeed. No secret and no big deal to me– I wouldn’t be running if I didn’t think otherwise.”

The story was picked up by DailyKos on Sunday, and was the subject of an AP story published on the Winston-Salem Journal’s website yesterday.  Even USA Today posted the story on its breaking news blog.

According to the Winston-Salem Journal article, Neal is the only Democrat who has so far entered the race for Dole’s seat, even though Democrats feel the Senator is vulnerable because of her support for the war in Iraq and because she was running the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the party’s general beating in the 2006 mid-term elections. The Congressional Quarterly listed her seat as one of the five most vulnerable in the country, yet Democrats are reportedly wary of signing up for what promises to be a very expensive campaign. Already declining to run are Attorney General Roy Cooper, Gov. Mike Easley, U.S. Rep. Brad Miller and two state legislators.

Enter Jim Neal, a Democratic fundraiser and founder of The Agema Group, a Chapel Hill-based corporate financial advisory firm. A North Carolina native, Neal returned to his home state last year. With many of the higher profile contenders opting out, it will be interesting to see if the national and state Democratic parties will help fuel Neal’s run. Even though he announced he filed his papers for candidacy on October 4, as of this writing, Jim Neal is nowhere to be found on the North Carolina Democratic Party’s list of 2008 candidates. On the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee’s Website, a news search turned up no results for Jim Neal. Ditto on the DSCC’s blog.

Does Democratic establishment’s silence on Neal’s candidacy reveal an admission that they do not believe Dole is defeatable? Is it a defiant shunning of a candidate new to the political scene who is apparently not a “chosen one?” Or worse still, does Democratic denial of Neal’s candidacy show their true colors when it comes to the politics of homosexuality? Perhaps the Dems want our votes, our contributions and our service, but they do not want queer participation in politics.