In the May 21 issue the Biblical Recorder published brief summaries of six candidates for the U.S. Congress who are members of Baptist churches affiliated with the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSC). Since that publication date three other candidates asked to be included. One was a member of a church that is not affiliated with BSC. One said he is a Baptist and was invited to provide the name of the Baptist church of his membership along with information for a story. He did not provide the material. The third candidate’s story follows. – The Editor
Albert Lee Wiley Jr. (10th District)
Dr. Albert Wiley was born in Forest City, N.C. He graduated from N.C. State University (BS) and worked as a nuclear engineer. He later graduated from the University of Rochester Medical School (MD), with further medical training at the University of Virginia, Stanford University and the University of Wisconsin (PhD). He specialized as a cancer physician and practiced oncology for more than 40 years in the U.S. Navy, as a professor at the University of Wisconsin and as professor and interim director of the East Carolina University Jenkins Cancer Center.
For the past 11 years he was director of a special nuclear emergency, medical response group (a Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security Administration asset) and was the head of the WHO Radiation Emergency Assistance Collaborating Center, where he responded to many U.S. and international radiation incidents – including Chernobyl, Fukushima, U.S. Embassies – and trained first-responder physicians and nurses in 25 countries including Israel, Iraq, China, Russia, Ukraine and Africa.
Wiley said, “I am not a professional politician, but from my youth I have always felt that politics was important.” His grandfather read the Congressional Record to him every week when he was a child. He agrees with President Dwight Eisenhower’s statement, “Politics should be every U.S. citizen’s avocation.”
This will be Wiley’s seventh run for Congress. The first was in 1984 when President Ronald Reagan endorsed him. “I thought I could help bring bio and medical technology jobs to a depressed mid-west area [at the time],” he said. “In 2002 I ran for U.S. Senate because I had served in the Navy during the Vietnam War and saw that mistake. I became concerned about the national neoconservative rhetoric of encouraging the U.S. Congress and President Bush to go to war in Iraq.”
When asked why he is making another attempt for office, Wiley said, “Now I want to try again because this election may be the most important in my lifetime. Our country can – and for future generations must – do better in so many ways. As in all my previous primary election attempts, I am again self-funding the campaign. No money is requested or accepted for the primary.
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Albert Wiley Jr. |
“Congress now needs to be very concerned with the preservation of our national security and the preservation of our Holy Bible-inspired constitution, and our Judeo-Christian heritage, and values of traditional marriage and family, and the sanctity of life – from conception until death.
“I consider the loss of a job by the family breadwinner to be a public health issue. It scares, depresses and demoralizes the entire family. I have seen this tragedy so often in my medical care of cancer patients and their families. So being a strong and informed advocate for attracting good jobs to the 10th district would be my high priority. I think my knowledge of the medical and biotechnology industries would help to do this. I speak their language and understand their infrastructure needs.
“I also believe my broad, life work experience in medicine, biotechnology and nuclear engineering prepares me to work on issues such as the tragic Obamacare legislation; to work on nuclear non-proliferation issues; and on preventing ISIS terrorism by stopping weapons of mass destruction from entering our open borders and enforcing our immigration laws.
“Congress must address our deficit and our dangerous 20 trillion dollar debt – which has doubled under the Obama administration – because this debt will severely compromise the freedom and quality of life of our children and grandchildren.”
Although he is retired Dr. Wiley continues to work part time as a cancer specialist, primarily in the eastern part of the state where he has a second home in Salter Path.
He said, “But I have deep, life-long ties to the 10th district and have a home in Forest City,” which was also the home of his grandfather, Forest Davis, for whom Forest City was named. His mother and father also lived there all of their lives. His father was the city manager.
Wiley is a Republican candidate who faces Jeff Gregory, Jeffrey Baker and incumbent Patrick McHenry in the June 7 10th District primary. He and his wife, Janet, have been married for 55 years. They have four children, seven grandchildren and two great grandchildren.
He was baptized at the First Baptist Church of Forest City and has maintained a life-long membership there.
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