Leading Antiwar Congressman Re-elected
by Eric Garris
November 9, 2000

Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), the leader of the antiwar movement in Congress, was handily re-elected on Tuesday.

Dr. Paul is a regular contributor to Antiwar.com and is the most consistently noninterventionist Congressman in recent history. He received over 60 percent of the vote.

He was the most vocal opponent of the wars against Serbia and Iraq, an active opponent of the military draft, and the most vocal opponent of Pentagon spending. He is also the leading proponent of free trade in Congress today.

Paul was first elected to Congress in 1976. He left Congress in 1984 and was the Libertarian Party candidate for President in 1988. He returned to Congress in 1996 by defeating an incumbent Republican, the only person in the country to beat an incumbent in his own primary that year. Every time he has run, his opponents have attacked him for taking principled stands for individual liberty, noninterventionism, and free trade.

This year his opponent was Loy Sneary, who garnered 48 percent against Paul in 1998. Both candidates spent over a million dollars each. Sneary had the support of the AFL/CIO and the teachers' union. The unions and the Democratic National Committee targetted the race with money and workers. The district is very large, bigger than the state of Vermont, with a huge media market.

Sneary attacked Paul for his opposition to drug prohibition, painting him as an isolationist and an ideologue (imagine that!). Paul never backed down from his principled stands, continuing to attack war and big government throughout the campaign.