ONE MORNING LAST FALL, Clay Aiken was lounging in bed in his mansion in Durham, North Carolina, reading the news off his phone, when he came across something that made him sit up and say, “Are you” – he mouths the f-word – “kidding me?” The government shutdown was in effect, and Aiken’s congresswoman, Republican Renee Ellmers, had not-so-graciously declined to decline her paycheck, explaining that while she had voted for the shutdown that was depriving hundreds of thousands of their livelihood, she, you know, actually needed the money.
In a fit of indignation, Aiken, former American Idol runner-up and crooner extraordinaire, decided enough was enough. For more than six months, party leaders had been trying to get him to challenge Ellmers, a tough task in an overwhelmingly red district.…
