By Matt Chapman, MBA ’02

I first met Tucker Anderson in the fall of 1989 when we were both freshman at Texas A&M. We became fast friends and have enjoyed a close friendship ever since.  Little did those starry-eyed Aggie freshmen know how integrally their lives would become enmeshed 16 years later.

After obtaining my MBA from Mays in 2002, I went to work as a VP for a consulting engineering firm in my hometown of Houston. After four years in this role, I sensed that a change was in order, so I took a leap of faith and left my cushy office job.

On my last day of work, Tucker called with big news. He was in the process of assembling a team for his run at the congressional seat for the 17th District of Texas in the U.S. House of Representatives. As an attorney and a native of the district who served for seven years as legislative director and lead counsel under Texas Congressman Pete Sessions, Tucker was certainly qualified to hold this seat.

From top to bottom: Campaign headquarters in Calvert; Tucker Anderson meets with constituents, and answers press questions.

Tucker surprised me by asking me to move to his hometown of Calvert (a town of about 1,400 folks located 35 miles north of College Station) to be a part of his campaign. As I recall, my initial comment was, “I assume you’ve got a campaign manager?”

“Well…we were thinking that you could fill that role nicely,” he responded.

I was more than a little shocked! I had always had an interest in politics and followed political goings-on with a fair amount of inquiry, but I never imagined that I would be running a campaign for U.S. Congress. Tucker was persistent and invited me to his campaign headquarters in Calvert to sit down and talk more about the proposition.

A few days later, I rolled through the lone stoplight in Calvert and walked into the old Calvert Movie Theater, which Tucker had converted into his campaign headquarters.  It was that instant that I knew that this wasn’t going to be your typical campaign. The “Tucker Anderson for Congress” campaign headquarters was far from what I envisioned a campaign war room to be. Tucker’s homespun roots showed in the rocking chairs and Civil War memorabilia that adorned his headquarters.

During our half-day meeting, Tucker explained that his opposition in the March 2006 congressional primary, Van Taylor, was a native Texan, Harvard MBA and decorated Iraq War veteran with a lot of resources at his disposal.

Typical to his nature, Tucker dismissed the aura that typically accompanies such credentials and told me how and why he could beat Van Taylor.  “I’m from this district, my family has farmed and ranched in this district for generations, and I have the fire in my belly to win this thing,” Tucker explained. Not much more persuasion was needed for me to agree to take my first political job— as campaign manager.

Because Van Taylor’s campaign had an advantage over us in terms of financial resources, it became evident that our campaign was going to be a true grassroots campaign. Tucker, his wife Stacy and I developed a strategy that we believed would lead us to victory on Election Day. We organized an incredibly dedicated team of more than 200 volunteers, mostly A&M students. The next months’ activities are a blur of daily phone banking, weekly mailers to constituents, automated phone calls and surveys, mapping of key counties and precincts to identify likely voters, TV & radio ads, Internet blogs, debates, attendance at candidate forums, and—most importantly—personally meeting the citizens of the 17th Congressional District.

And so I embarked on my first campaign…every day was an 18-hour workday and I soon learned there was no such thing as “time off.”  Each day also presented its own challenges in terms of jockeying for information control and garnering positive media coverage, which I loved. At no time in my life had I worked so hard to achieve a single goal. This dynamic venture continued months leading up to primary election day on March 7, 2006.

Periodically throughout the campaign we polled the electorate and the results showed us leading the race by anywhere from 5 to 12 percent. In early voting, we learned that Tucker was leading in 10 of the 12 counties in the district. Needless to say, I was feeling pretty good. 

On election day, I manned polls and reached out to voters one last time as they entered their polling places to determine who would move on to the November general election. I was shocked at the number of TV and radio satellite trucks that had assembled outside of Jake’s, the local tavern in Calvert where we were hosting the election-night party. The room full of volunteers and supporters was glued to the TV as the results began to come in.

But Van Taylor’s last minute media blitz somehow turned the tide and propelled him to victory… he had 56 percent of the vote, compared to 46 percent.

In interview after interview, Tucker graciously accepted the decision his constituents had made without a bit of acrimony or bitterness in his voice.

Late that night after media and well-wishers faded away, Tucker and I and three or four staffers ignored our exhaustion. We sat talking into the wee hours of the morning, expressing regret over questionable decisions and talking admirably about Taylor’s last-minute rally. But most of all, I think we just wanted to enjoy each others’ company one last time.  We all knew that the next day would be the end of a unique experience that we all shared—we built incredible bonds, amassed hundreds of anecdotes and felt as though we had given our all to a worthy cause.

Looking back one year later, I have an extraordinary feeling of fondness for the experience. While being outspent by more than 4:1, we were able to amass almost half the vote based on an incredible amount of support from volunteers whose blood, sweat and tears were an immeasurable contribution to the campaign. 

No matter what the polls say, I have concluded that I won my personal campaign of gaining experience, political acumen and most importantly, friends I know I will be able to call on for years to come.

Today, Matt Chapman is a project manager for Houston’s JNS Consulting Engineers. He’s still involved with politics, but from the urban planning and infrastructure angle, working with local municipal planning departments and city councils on land development, public works and transportation projects. Though he has no plans to work on another campaign, he admits that if the right candidate asked, he’d truly consider it.