The Greensboro News & Record reports that U.S. Rep. Howard Coble, Republican of N.C.’s 6th Congressional District and the longest serving member in the Tar Heel State’s congressional delegation, will run for re-election:
U.S. Rep. Howard Coble, saying he would “take a back seat to no one when it comes to providing constituent services,” will seek re-election to a 15th term.
The 80-year-old Greensboro Republican held a news conference at his local office this afternoon to say he would run in the newly drawn 6th congressional district. The new district will be significantly different for him; just two of his current six counties are in the eight-county district.
“People have been asking me for several months if I was going to run again,” he said in a news release, “and my answer was that I was waiting to see if the new congressional maps would remain in place. When the court ruled last Friday that a temporary injunction would not be granted, that was my signal to make a final decision about seeking another term.
This is quite a feat for Coble. I wasn’t even a twinkle in my father’s eye when he joined Congress in January 1985.
Due to the redrawn district maps, the 6th District now stretches across the central North Carolina-Virginia border and dips down into the triad, plus Orange and Durham counties. The district is slightly less Republican than it was under the old maps. GOP presidential candidate John McCain would have carried the 6th with 56 percent of the vote under the new maps, compared to the actual tally of 63 percent under the old maps.
Even so, Coble shouldn’t have any trouble hanging on, barring some unforeseen event (and politics has plenty of those, as witnessed yesterday). Coble won his last re-election outing in 2010 with 75 percent of the vote.
Update: Here is video of Coble’s announcement.