Outgoing Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts has confirmed what everyone has expected for the last couple months – he will apply for the U-S Senate seat being vacated next month by Ben Sasse, who is becoming the next president of the University of Florida.
Ricketts’ announcement came one day after Governor-Elect Jim Pillen revealed that Sasse had told him he will officially resign at noon on Sunday, January 8th. Pillen is accepting applications for the senate seat through Friday, Dec 23.
Ricketts told a news conference on a different subject this morning he hadn’t acted until now because he felt Sasse and Pillen needed to act first.
Ricketts, who unsuccessfully ran for U.S. Senate in 2006, said in his written statement that the decision to seek the appointment came after many hours of prayer and family discussion.
Ricketts is seen as a shoe-in for the appointment given his endorsement of Pillen and donation of over $100,000 to his campaign, with Nebraska Democratic Party Chair Jane Kleeb tweeting it as “the state’s most obvious pay-to-play case/”
Asked about it at the news conference, Ricketts said he considered himself “an applicant like everybody else.”
There will be 4 years remaining on Sasse’s term and some people have complained the vacancy won’t be filled by a special election as was done when Congressman Jeff Fortenberry resigned this past spring.
Ricketts says those individuals don’t realize the Senate sets the rules and holds elections to fill out remaining terms only at general elections.
One other person has applied for the appointment, retired Lt Colonel John Weaver of Omaha, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination to succeed Fortenberry.
Ricketts has no idea what it’s like to be a TRUE Nebraskan. He’s the son of a billionaire. He’s a rich kid. His day-to-day life is so vastly different from 99.9% of his constituents because of that. Give me a working class senator. Give me someone who understands what it’s like to live a NORMAL life the rest of us 99.9-percenters.
The GOP has become a party of billionaire-worshipers and I’m sick of it. Every billionaire in this country made their fortune by either (a) inheriting it from their folks or (b) stealing it from working class. Billionaires are not decent people. It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God!
I hope the millions of dollars Ricketts pours into this little stunt gets wasted like the last time he ran for senator. Good riddance, Pete. Glad to see you gone.