On Monday (Jan 10) Clay Aiken announced that he planned to run for congress again. The first time around, the American Idol season 2 alum lost the general election for district NC-2 in 2014 against Republican Renee Ellmers.
This time, however, he’s running in the newly formed district NC-6, which leans Democratic. But the primary will by no means be a cakewalk. The singer will have to run a gauntlet of Dem opponents in the primary. At least 7 so far.
When Clay’s congressman David Price announced his retirement in October after 35 years in the House, several people approached Clay and asked if he’d be interested in running for Price’s seat. At first he took a wait and see attitude, but it was a homophobic speech make by Lt. Governor Mark Robinson, that motivated Clay to say yes.
“I got your purpose, b—-. I will show you”
Clay explains to Variety in a recent interview: “He gave a speech in which he said, ‘What is the purpose of homosexuality? What purpose do homosexuals serve?’ I watched that sort of with just dumb struck awe that someone could be so ignorant. After watching it, I said, you know, ‘I got your purpose, b—-. I will show you.”
Now, Clay is hoping to become the first openly gay member of Congress from the south.
Here are a couple of excerpts from the Variety interview.
How American Idol prepared him for politics:
“Idol was, in many ways, sort of a boot camp to learn about how to take criticism in front of 40 million people on live TV, and be told you’re awful or told you’re good or told you look weird or whatnot — and learn how to shake criticism off. Obviously, I had a lot of experience with being picked on and bullied before Idol and since Idol. It wasn’t the only time I got crap for something, but it certainly was an opportunity to learn what’s important and what you need to worry about and take seriously versus what’s superficial and what you don’t need to get your feelings hurt about. I think it gives you an opportunity to put things in perspective a little bit more.
He is scheduled to perform in Pittsburgh this summer
“I did something in Pittsburgh again last summer and honestly, I’m still slated to do something Pittsburgh this summer — that’s how much I had not expected to run.” He refuses to share what the project is or if he’ll proceed. Obviously, it depends on whether he wins the primary this Spring or not.
Clay came in second place on Former President Trump’s reality show, The Apprentice in 2013.
“I didn’t know this despotic part of him — or at least I didn’t see it. No one who was on it when I was on it was ever close to him. But when he got elected, I think I knew enough about him to recognize really all he wanted was attention and for people to like him and know his name. So I reserved a little bit of hope, honestly, that he would, after winning the election, want so badly for everyone to love him that he would retreat and start trying to make everyone on both sides love him.”
Clay believes Donald Trump suffers from a personality disorder
“It’s really hard when you’re talking about someone who’s clearly such a narcissist that without being a psychiatrist myself, I can’t really even speak on that. He has mental and psychiatric disorders [that] I think are obvious to most people who watch him. It’s hard to comment on it. I mean, you can say someone’s bats— crazy? I really think at times I feel sorry for how sickly demented he is. It hurt my heart for the whole country to have to live through that. And for the people who love him and are snowed by the fact that they believe this man cares about them — I can promise you, he doesn’t.”
Clay is set to appear on The View Wednesday Jan 12. Check your local listings.
