has been endorsed by Howard Dean, former chairman of the national Democratic Party, former governor of Vermont and 2004 candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.
If he wins, he might find himself running in November against a Republican who is married to an Iranian-American. But both Pooran and Kathryn Afzali must first survive major primary challenges next month.
He is a medical doctor—as is Howard Dean, a point Dean noted in endorsing Pooran.
Dean said, “When I was running for president [in 2004], I would tell people that in politics the difference between doctors and lawyers is that doctors are fact-based—we solve problems; we don’t argue about hem. Dr. Pooran is going to go to Congress to fight for working families and solve real problems. Maryland’s Sixth District has been poorly represented for 20 years and this year is a real opportunity for Democrats to change that. There is only one true progressive in the Democratic primary, and only one candidate who can win in November—Dr. Milad Pooran.
Pooran emphasizes the fact that he is a physician—and that he is not a career office holder, like his chief primary opponent. “I think the way our country was designed to be was truly private citizens who felt strongly in a case and then went into politics for that purpose,” says Pooran. “And then they went back to being private citizens.”
Pooran is running in Maryland’s Sixth Congressional District, which takes in the entire long western arm of the state. It has been represented for 20 years by Republican Roscoe Bartlett. But Bartlett is now doddering at age 85, and the district map was redrawn this year and made far more Democratic.
The one thing everyone—except Roscoe Bartlett—seems to agree on is that Roscoe Bartlett will soon be out of a job. Seven Republicans are challenging him, including Afzali, a Tea Party Republican and member of the Maryland House of Delegates.
On the Democratic side, Pooran faces State Senator Robert Garagiola, generally viewed as the front-runner, John Delaney, a commercial banker, Mark Shriver, a former state delegate, and lawyers Charles Bailey and Ron Little.
Walter Ludwig, a veteran of many congressional campaigns, is working for Pooran this year. He said the district map was re-drawn specifically to promote Garagiola, who is the majority leader of the State Senate.
But Ludwig says Pooran’s background as an immigrant will help him within the new boundaries of the district. He said his calculations show the district has one of the highest percentages of foreign-born voters of any congressional district in the country. “Milad has a story to tell them that no other candidate can tell,” Ludwig said.
Pooran is currently in private practice. But he is also a physician in the Air Force Reserve and served a tour in Iraq. He holds the reserve rank of lieutenant colonel. He had to suspend his campaign during January when he was sent to Germany for his annual period of active duty. His new wife, Amy, a pediatric nurse, filled in for him at campaign events that month.
Pooran has made job creation a major focus of his campaign and rebuilding the industrial base a major goal. He said all that starts with reform of the tax code, which he says has become a political tool to provide tax havens for the wealthy and rewards for businesses that move jobs overseas.
His parents were engineers who left Iran shortly after the revolution and settled in Maryland. His father worked on the system design for the Space Shuttle’s robotic arm. Pooran says, “We came here with just six suitcases and the American dream.”
Pooran graduated Phi Beta Kappa in biochemistry from the University of Maryland in College Park and received his medical doctorate in 2000 from the University of Maryland School, of Medicine in Baltimore.
Six years ago, Pooran ran unsuccessfully for a seat on the Prince George’s County Board of Education.