How a kid who worked his way through high school got a spot in Jimmy Carter’s press office
Former President Jimmy Carter signs books at Quail Ridge Books in Raleigh, North Carolina, on April 2, 2014.
The following essay is by Randy Lewis, who worked in the Carter White House. On the 39th president’s 91st birthday, The Takeaway explores what life would have been like under a Carter second term. Listen to the full episode.
I worked for Jimmy Carter for almost six years. This includes four years in the White House and 21 months on his presidential campaign staff. Most of my friends only vaguely know that I worked for him in some capacity. I know the story that follows seems too fantastical to be true, but it is — every word.
I was one of those kids who worked all through high school. A family crisis made me into a self-supporting teen. I was a gas station attendant, busboy, short order cook, janitor, dishwasher and pizza chef. I worked 30 to 40 hours a week after school, and it was reflected in my grades. This also meant that if I was going to college, I was going to pay for it myself.
I had two great loves — music and politics/government. But the after school jobs curtailed my music involvement, so I focused on politics and government. I decided I needed to develop a plan that would allow me to pursue politics as a career, while finding a way to fund college.
The plan was simple: I would read every book, magazine, and newspaper story I could find on presidential politics and use this base knowledge to get a job on a presidential campaign. Then, after the campaign ended, I would move to Washington, use my campaign connections to get a part time job on Capitol Hill or at a federal agency, and attend one of the D.C. area colleges at night for a degree. The plan, I thought, was brilliant.
At this point in my story, you should notice that my plan did not include the candidate I worked for becoming president of the United States.
In December 1974, while still a senior in high school, I was elected to be a Florida delegate to the first ever Democratic Party National Mid-Term Convention. All of the 1976 presidential hopefuls would be there, testing the waters. This is when I first met Jimmy Carter. He had just announced he was running for president.
I was greatly impressed with Carter. He was a Southerner like me, and he was very much a free-market Democrat. That sounds strange in the current political context, but he was one and so was I. My full-time high school employment taught me that just about every problem in a person’s life can be fixed with a decent job and a paycheck. I learned that commerce and free and open marketplaces are essential to people improving themselves and their lives. He talked like he believed it, too. I was all in.
In May 1975, a month before high school graduation, I got a call asking me if I wanted to help with the Carter campaign. Like the big scene in a movie, or the critical chapter in a book, it was the call that would change the trajectory of my life.
I started by helping to open the Florida campaign office. I think the campaign paid me $20 a week at first — gas money — so I kept working at a pizza place at night. In March of 1976, Jimmy Carter won the Florida primary.
After a few days of discussions, it was decided that I was ready to direct the Carter campaign in a congressional district in Superior, Wisconsin. When I arrived in mid-March, Lake Superior was still frozen and it got dark at four in the afternoon. Coming from Florida, I didn’t own a winter coat.
Carter was not expected to win Wisconsin, but he was trying to make a strong showing in a Northern state. I was assigned to a congressional district that we were expected to lose 2-to-1. I was there for three freezing weeks, but it all turned out well. Not only did Carter win Wisconsin, but we nearly won my congressional district.
The next morning, most of the Wisconsin-based staff were getting new assignments and leaving for the airport. I was held back, but no reason was given. I feared that Wisconsin was the end of the line for me. Eventually, I was told that there was a job for me, but that I should go home to Florida and rest for a week.
About a week later, I got a call, telling me I would be Jimmy Carter’s aircraft coordinator. For the next seven months, my life was airplanes, hotels and long days. I flew to three to six cities a day and woke up in a different hotel every morning. I worked 18 to 20 hour days. I took every assignment given and was eager for the next.I went to endless campaign events, listened in on hundreds of high-level political and policy briefings and learned to nap on planes and buses while standing up.
This also gave me the opportunity to work with reporters, editors and producers at all of the national media outlets. For them, I was the kid on the plane, and I became sort of their campaign mascot. I never imagined at the time that media and public relations would become my life’s work.
At the end of the primaries in June 1976, Carter had sealed the presidential nomination. This was the beginning of the summer of ‘76 — perhaps the greatest summer of my life. I lived in a hotel in Americus, Georgia, with other staffers and the national press corp. Each day would involve some event with Carter — sometimes just a softball game — and evenings were filled with wine, songs and storytelling. It was the desperately needed down time everyone needed before the beginning of the fall campaign. This was at a time when the nominees took most of August off and launched their campaigns on Labor Day. Those days are long gone now, with never-ending campaigns.
The fall was a blur of campaigning. By mid-October, we campaigned almost seven days a week, visiting up to six cities a day. We stopped in some cities just long enough for people to do laundry and sleep, and then started again.
The election night victory party was in Atlanta and fun. But, the 5 a.m. flight the next morning from Atlanta to Plains, Georgia, produced one of the most memorable moments of my life. We arrived just as the sun was rising, and the people of Plains came out to welcome their favorite son home. The little 685-person town had produced an American president. There wasn’t a dry eye in town everyone hugged Jimmy Carter and expressed their pride. I’ll never forget the faces I saw or the emotions I experienced that morning. It was a life lesson in American Exceptionalism.
Elections create change, and this election was no exception for me. Within a few hours, an Air Force colonel flew into Plains and took my job. The functions of the bureaucracy had arrived. I was initially reassigned to the president-elect's scheduling office, but my future was uncertain.
The next 10 weeks were very tense for me. I made it known that I wanted to go to Washington and needed a job somewhere in the administration. But, I was only 20 and hadn’t gone to college yet.
About two weeks before the inauguration, I was called to a meeting with Press Secretary Jody Powell and was told that I was going to get a position in the West Wing Press Office on the condition that I promised I would take classes toward getting my degree.
I promised, and I meant it.
I had no idea what my actual job was to be or what I was going to do. The Press Office had a staff of about 12 people. It is located in the West Wing, and I was given a desk that looked into the Rose Garden. My job was to handle most of the basic media inquiries and assist with presidential photo opportunities, press conferences and events
I arrived at 7 a.m. as the morning news programs came on the air, and I left at 7 p.m. as the last nightly news programs began. Nearly every work day was followed by drinks and dinner with journalists, receptions or additional events at the White House. I discovered quickly that the college class promise was going to be a tough promise to keep, although I did take two or three classes at nearby George Washington University.
I could tell a thousand stories about things that I did while I was there, but that could fill several volumes. In short, I took advantage of every opportunity to be part of every event, every day.
After his re-election loss, I was out of a job. I returned to my home in Orlando, and, after a few years of trying my hand in the real estate business, returned to politics and government. I directed campaigns, worked for the speaker of the Florida House, the State Commissioner of Education, and other state agencies. I eventually moved to the private sector working for three global consulting firms before starting a small public relations and public affairs firm with my wife, Sandy. All have been great blessings to us.