Wally Pang (I)

Current Job:

Birth Date:

August 4, 1941

Religion:

Southern Baptist

Education:

Delta State University, BBA Business Administration

Biography:

Wally Pang was born in the Mississippi Delta town of Marks and lives in nearby Batesville. He earned a bachelor's degree in business administration in 1966 from Delta State University in Cleveland, MS. Pang attended the Art Institute of Chicago for two years to study sculpture, but did not complete a degree.

Pang and his wife, Mabel, operated Wally's Hong Kong Restaurant for 22 years in Batesville. He retired in 2008. The Pangs have three adult children.

Profile:

Wally Pang says illegal immigration is his top issue as he runs for Congress. He says he worries that a billion people might enter the United States over the next couple of decades if federal officials don't tighten regulations about who may enter and stay in the country. Pang, whose grandfather emigrated from China in 1901, worries that rapid growth could strain the United States' infrastructure. "When there's a billion people and everybody flushes the toilet at the same time, all that sewage from that toilet is going to be overflowing," Pang told The Associated Press in a June 2008 interview. He said he is refusing to accept campaign contributions because he believes money corrupts the American political system. He also said he wants Congress to try to break up what he sees as a monopoly by oil companies. He said he believes that such congressional action, combined with drilling for oil in wildlife preserves in Alaska, would decrease gasoline prices

Campaigns:

Wally Pang ran unsuccessfully for a Mississippi House of Representatives seat in 2007 as a Republican. He lost to Democratic incumbent Warner McBride.In 2008, Pang is running in north Mississippi's 1st Congressional District. The seat became vacant in December 2007 when Trent Lott resigned from a U.S. Senate seat and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour moved U.S. Rep. Roger Wicker to the Senate. Barbour, Lott and Wicker are all Republicans; Wicker first won the 1st Congressional District seat in November 1994.Several candidates, including Pang, competed in a nonpartisan special election in the spring of 2008 to fill the final few months of the two-year term Wicker had started in January 2007. Travis Childers won a special election runoff in May 2008.In the Nov. 4, 2008, general election, the candidates are Democrat Childers, Republican Greg Davis, Pang and Green Party candidate John M. Wages Jr.