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Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson announced in September that he would not be seeking reelection for a fourth term as the city’s mayor in 2025, leading to speculation as to who might be in the running for the open seat.
A long list of potential mayoral candidates have since been discussed, among them: Republican Mobile County Commissioner Connie Hudson, U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl, R-AL, former Mobile police chief Paul Prine, and Mobile City Council members William Carroll, Josh Woods, and Gina Gregory.
Also in the mix is Democratic state legislator Rep. Barbara Drummond — she once served as executive director of administrative services and community affairs in Mobile under former Mayor Sam Jones — who told AL.com in September that she was “strongly considering” pursuing the mayoral seat.
Her colleague in the state legislature, Sen. Vivian Figures, also indicated interest when asked by AL.com about a potential run. The outlet reported that the senator, who previously served as a Mobile City Councilwomen from 1993-1997, was also “considering” a run after receiving calls encouraging her to put her name on the ticket.
Figures and her family are deeply involved in Alabama politics. Vivian is the mother of Shomari Figures, a former Obama administration organizer and DOJ attorney who is currently running for Alabama’s 2nd Congressional District seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Shomari is the frontrunner in that race, with the most recent polling giving him a double-digit advantage over his Republican opponent Caroleene Dobson.
Additionally, the seat which Vivian Figures now occupies previously belonged to her late husband, and Shomari’s father, Michael Figures, who was a leading civil rights figure and politician who served in the Alabama State Senate from 1978-1996. Michael Figures gained national attention in the 1980’s while serving as lead attorney in the civil suit that would ultimately bankrupt the Ku Klux Klan.
Vivian Figures was elected to succeed her husband in the State Senate in 1997 after Michael’s District 33 seat became vacant subsequent to his passing. In 2008, Figures became the first female African American nominee to run for the U.S. Senate, though she ultimately failed to be elected. Figures then went on to become the first woman in the history of the Alabama state legislature to be named party leader, serving as the Senate Minority Leader of the Democratic party in 2013 and 2014.
Now, 1819 News is reporting that Figures does indeed intend to run for the Mobile Mayorship in 2025, according to their sources. If Figures is elected Mayor, her current seat in the State Senate will become vacant for the first time since she succeeded her late husband in 1997. In that scenario, whoever comes to fill Figures’s seat would then serve the remainder of her term which is set to end in November of 2026.
Sen. Figures’s office did not respond to APR’s request for comment on her potential mayoral candidacy.
