By Rick Dandes
FREEBURG — Snyder County Commissioner Malcolm Derk, a Republican, announced his candidacy for U.S. Congress in Pennsylvania’s 10th District on Monday night, vowing to run a vigorous campaign against the “well-funded” incumbent, Democrat Chris Carney.
Conceding that it takes a minimum of about $400,000 to $500,000 to run a primary campaign, Derk said he planned to run a grass-roots campaign using the Internet and credit card donations to raise money.
“I think that’s the future of campaign fundraising,” he said. “In a way, I think it’s an advantage over those who self-fund their campaigns. I have to go out there and prove to every individual why I deserve their vote and their contributions.”
It will be an uphill battle, however, because Carney reportedly has substantial support from political-action committees and $400,000 in the bank.
Derk said the point that drove him to consider throwing his hat into the ring occurred when he saw the nearly $800 billion stimulus package pass.
“I feel passionately that it’s not government’s role to create jobs,” Derk said. “That is something that businesses and entrepreneurs do.
“They are the engines that fuel the economy, and they will ultimately get us out of the recession.”
Throwing money at a problem hasn’t helped, Derk said.
“We were promised unemployment wouldn’t hit more than 8 percent; we hit 10 percent last month. This proves the funding priority of Nancy Pelosi and the House Democrats didn’t work. And as a county commissioner, I know that the jobs we were promised never came.”
Derk said he would have opposed the stimulus plan.
Derk, who is 27, said his age should not be an issue.
“Everyone mentions how young I am,” he said. “But I have experience running a government agency. As commissioners, we had to balance multimillion dollar budgets, and we did so without raising taxes.”
He said his top priority, if elected, would be to make fiscally responsible decisions.
“We have to be very careful with how we spend taxpayer dollars,” he said, “because it isn’t an infinite resource. You can’t constantly mortgage the future to get by today. It’s unacceptable to give handouts to Wall Street, banks and automobile firms.”
Name recognition is also sure to be a problem. The 10th District includes all of Snyder, Union, Montour, Northumberland, Bradford, Wayne, Wyoming, Sullivan, Susquehanna, and Pike counties and parts of Lackawanna, Luzerne, Lycoming and Tioga counties. Derk said that over the past few weeks, he has driven through them all, talking to voters and county commissioners.
But Kathleen Hummel, chairwoman of the Pike County Republican Committee, said Monday she doesn’t know anything about Derk or the policies he stands for. “He has a lot of work to do and a lot of people to meet,” she said.
Nevertheless, Derk said: “People have the same concerns everywhere. They are concerned about the direction the country is taking now. I think there is a rally cry. People are looking for a candidate that express their largely conservative outlook.”
Three years ago, Derk had no plans to run for U.S. Congress.
“But three years ago,” he said, “there wasn’t one party domination in Washington. I am stepping into the ring because I believe that responsible conservative voices need to be heard.”
