Sue's 8th Annual Golf Classic
       Monday, September 20th

    Sue's 2010 Campaign Kickoff
       Monday, September 25th!

See featured videos »

• Sue Files for Re-Election!  read»
• Sue Speaks to GOP Women read»
• Sue Co-Sponsors Bill to Revoke Terrorists' Citizenship read»
• Sue wins Concerned Women for America award! read»
• Sue Pushes NC to Join Health Care Lawsuit read»
• Sue Talks About 'Radicalization' Videos read»
• Myrick Speaks out on Healthcare Reform read»
• Sue: Obama Dragging Feet on Iran read»
• Listen to Sue's Stance on Healthcare Listen»
• Federal Anti-Gang Office will be Permanent read»
• New VA Clinic in Charlotte read»
• Myrick: Abolish the IRS read»
• Myrick Says Deportation Program Helps NC read»
• Sue Speaks in favor of Kristen's Act (Video) watch»

9th Congressional District Profile
(from the 2008 Almanac of American Politics)

“An agreeable village but in a damn rebellious country,” recorded General Cornwallis when, before the unpleasantness at Yorktown, he visited Charlotte, North Carolina. “A veritable nest of hornets.” This town, settled by Scots-Irish and German colonists who came down the Blue Ridge from Pennsylvania, is now a rapidly-growing metropolitan area of 1.5 million people. Before the California gold rush, Charlotte was the gold mining capital of the country; in 1837, the U.S. Mint established a branch here. Now, Charlotte is headquarters to two of the nation’s biggest banks: Bank of America, formed from the 1998 merger of Charlotte-based NationsBank and San Francisco’s Bank of America; and Wachovia, created by the 2001 merger of Charlotte’s First Union and Winston-Salem’s Wachovia. All told, $1.8 trillion in banking resources are headquartered in Charlotte—more than in any American city except New York. Charlotte is also home to nine companies in the Fortune 500, including Duke Energy, Sonic Automotive, B.F. Goodrich and Nucor; it is the center of the nation’s biggest textile manufacturing region, and serves as a hub for troubled USAirways.

The past two decades have brought Charlotte cultural growth worthy of its growing business stature. It now boasts a $50 million performing arts center across from the 60-story Bank of America tower, and is home to the NFL Panthers and the NBA Bobcats franchise owned by Black Entertainment Television founder Robert Johnson. The rebelliousness Cornwallis noted can be seen in this region’s passion for the booming stock-car circuit: One of the nation’s biggest auto-racing tracks is here, and just up the road is Mooresville, home of the sport’s giant, the late Dale Earnhardt, andthe family's racing business. In 2010, the NASCAR Hall of Fame is scheduled to open in Charlotte. The city has built a boosterish pride in its capacity for accommodation. It is proud that it responded amicably to a busing order approved in a landmark Supreme Court case in 1971; that it twice elected Harvey Gantt, who is black, then replaced him with Sue Myrick, a Republican whose grievance wasn’t race but traffic. Charlotte’s metro area is projected to equal Atlanta’s by 2030, and environmental critics said it had the worst sprawl of the 15 fast-growing metro areas.

The 9th Congressional District of North Carolina includes about half of Mecklenburg County; it extends west to include most of Gaston County, long a textile center, and south to take in upscale bedroom communities in Union County, North Carolina’s fastest-growing county from 1990 to 2006 (population up 108%), where one-seventh of the population is employed in construction. Mecklenburg County as a whole is politically marginal, but the 9th District is overwhelmingly Republican. With 20% growth between 2000 and 2005, this is the state’s fastest-growing congressional district.

The congresswoman from the 9th District is Sue Myrick, a Republican first elected in 1994. Myrick grew up and went to college in Ohio, raised her family in Charlotte, owned an advertising agency and Amway distributorship. In 1981 she ran for the Charlotte citycouncil and lost. She ran again and won in 1983, ran for mayor and lost in 1985, then beat Harvey Gantt in 1987. Despite nasty personal charges, she was reelected in 1989; she is proud of making infrastructure improvements and preventing property tax increases for four years. Myrick ran for the Senate in 1992, but was beaten by Lauch Faircloth in the primary 48%-30%. In 1994 Charlotte Congressman Alex McMillan, passed over for the ranking position on the House Budget Committee, retired. In the first round of the primary, against State House Minority Leader David Balmer, Myrick led 34%-28%. Before the runoff three weeks later, it was revealed that he had falsely claimed on his resume to have graduated in the top 20% of his law school class and to have played varsity soccer. Myrick won 68%-32%, then easily won the general. Myrick was a leader of the 1994 Republican freshman class. She served on Newt Gingrich’s transition team and was freshman liaison to the leadership. But she communicated with leaders of the unsuccessful coup against Gingrich in July 1997, and later that month lost the post of Conference secretary by 11065 to Deborah Pryce, whom Gingrich backed.

Myrick, a reliable conservative, has taken a lead role on many Republican initiatives. Representing a prosperous and growing district, she turned down the Transportation Committee’s offer of $15 million for Charlotte’s outerbelt because she felt the transportation bill would bust the budget: “I said when I ran for this job, ‘If you want somebody to bring home the bacon, don’t send me.’” With relatively few textile workers in her district, she voted for trade promotion authority. After apparent congressional leaks of post-September 11 intelligence data, Myrick proposed that members of Congress undergo the same background checks as non-elected security officials. Not surprisingly, the bill was not passed. A vocal opponent of illegal immigration, she won House approval in December 2005 of a measure to deport illegal immigrants convicted of drunk-driving. On the proposal for Dubai Ports World to purchase several U.S. ports, she wrote President Bush: “Not just NO—but HELL NO!”

Myrick had surgery for breast cancer in 1999 and underwent three months of chemotherapy and another six weeks of radiation treatment. After that, she sponsored the law to provide Medicaid coverage for low-income women for mammograms and pap smears. Myrick co-chaired the Cancer Caucus, and cosponsored with Nita Lowey a bill to require the National Institutes of Health to explore the connection between the environment and cancer. Myrick was declared cancer-free. In January 2005, after eight years on the leadership-controlled Rules Committee, she switched to Energy and Commerce, where she focused on health care, including mental health.

After the 2002 election, Myrick filed a change in the rules of the House Republican Conference to require that each Appropriations subcommittee chairman secure party approval; Speaker Dennis Hastert modified the proposal to give the review power to the leadership’s Steering Committee, and it was approved. In 2003, she became chairman of the expanded Republican Study Committee, activist conservatives who have urged spending restraint. She said that she felt “betrayed” by Senate Republicans for halving President Bush’s proposed tax cuts, and that they needed to “get a handle on the deficit.” Myrick considered, but quickly decided against, Senate bids in 2002 and 2004. She also turned down calls to run for governor in 2008. She has won reelection easily.