When the votes are counted from the June 21 Republican runoff for the U.S. Senate, Katie Britt will emerge victorious over Congressman Mo Brooks.
Britt is one of those rare individuals who seems destined for greatness as if touched by an angel. But to think that Britt’s success was somehow fated denies the reality that her work ethic, intelligence and perseverance have given her life and career a sense of inevitability.
Her story could be a Hollywood movie: a small-town girl who, as a youngster, works in the family hardware business, goes to college and becomes the student body president, marries the captain of the football team, and has two adorable, bright children, becomes an accomplished lawyer and chief of staff to Alabama’s senior senator and then a senator herself. But wait, Tinseltown would never make such an uplifting film. Where is the scandal, the mean girl antics and the hidden demons that lead to the moment of reckoning?
Left coast movie moguls wouldn’t make Britt’s life story into a movie because it’s just too nice for today’s cynical culture. But here in Alabama, we believe that good character, right living and service-minded individuals still exist.
Britt’s rise personally and politically, in many ways, is the American dream writ large, where hard work and determination result in success.
On the campaign trail, Britt has traveled to every corner of the state, meeting people where they live, from coffee shops and dinners to county fairs and civic clubs. She has shaken hands and looked her fellow Alabamians in the eye. She has listened to their worries, heard their dreams and assured them that she would work for them.
An old saying goes, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Britt cares about the people of our state and their future. When she takes her seat in the hollow chamber of the U.S. Senate, it’s the people she will be thinking about and not her next appearance on Fox News. She will not go to Washington for fame or fortune but to represent the people of Alabama.
Britt will fight for Alabama as a happy warrior, not as a bully or a toady. She is a new generation of leaders who still believe America is a shining city on a hill that is a beacon of hope, not a graveyard of despair. Too many of today’s leaders have lost sight of our country’s greatness. Britt understands the nation’s present challenges and values its past promises and future opportunities. Perhaps she, like few others, understands that America is great because it is good and best when we work together. It is not corny or old-fashioned to believe we are one nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.
Even now, as the election seems sure to swing Britt’s way, she remains on the road talking, listening and working.
Yes, Katie Britt is one of those rare characters on life’s stage who is genuinely destined for this moment. And at 40 years old, there is a lot more she will accomplish for our state and nation. Don’t be surprised if, in 10 years, people are voting for a vice-president or president Britt.
Britt will win on June 21 and then again in the November general election, and it will be a victory for us all.
