In late 2005, a ranch hand from Dunning, Nebraska, with a PhD in history from Yale launched a seemingly hopeless campaign for Congress. The western two-thirds of Nebraska voted for Bush by a 3-1 margin in 2004. Tom Osborne, the current Congressman, was retiring to run for Governor of Nebraska, but it was still such a significant uphill battle that Scott Kleeb was basically laughed out of the office when he approached national Democratic Party officials about running.
But Kleeb was not deterred. And over the next several months, he spoke to people across the third district of Nebraska, listening to their concerns, and spreading a real message of hope for all Nebraskans. Then a funny thing happened: people started believing. By September, his internal polling was showing him ahead of Republican candidate Adrian Smith. A week before the election, George Bush had to come to Grand Island, Nebraska, to bail Smith out. And though, in the end, the election went to Smith, it was not a failure. Scott Kleeb connected with people, many of whom had never even met a Democrat, let alone voted for one. And it's that encouragement that leads to the next chapter of this campaign.
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