Sittenfeld ’07 declares Senate candidacy for Ohio’s 2016 race

Alexander “P.G.” Sittenfeld ’07, the youngest city council member in Cincinnati history, recently declared his candidacy for the position of U.S. Senator from Ohio in the 2016 race against incumbent Republican Rob Portman.

Sittenfeld is thefirst candidatefrom the Democratic Party to announce an entrance into the 2016 U.S. Senate race in Ohio.

Sittenfeld said he intends to focus his campaign on creating educational opportunities for youth, economic security for the elderly and protection for the environment.

“The biggest thing I can do right now is run a high-energy campaign that is based on big ideas and values that I think most Ohioans agree with,” Sittenfeld said.

While ideology divides Portman and Sittenfeld, Sittenfeld is also significantly younger than the 59 year-old incumbent: at 31 years old in 2016, Sittenfeld would be only one year over the age required by the U.S. Constitution in order to take office in the Senate.

“When I think about Rob Portman, I think he spent more than a quarter of a century in Washington holding stacks of debt against the middle class,” Sittenfeld said. “The only way that things are going to be different and that the government is going to be a force for good in people’s lives is if we send new leaders to the Senate.”

Portman, who did not respond to a request for comment, was elected as a congressman in 1993 and held high-level roles in the Bush administration before becoming a senator.

At the University, Sittenfeld concentrated in English with a certificate in American studies. He was involved in a range of extracurricular activities, including serving as freshman class president and writing for University Press Club and The Daily Princetonian.

“When I think back on my time at Princeton, one of my first memories is of me trying everything,” Sittenfeld said. “When I arrived on campus, I ran for freshman class president. I walked onto the crew team. I auditioned for the dance group diSiac.”

Sittenfeld’s senior thesis advisor, William Gleason, an English professor, first met Sittenfeld in an American studies course that Sittenfeld took during his freshman fall. Gleason said Sittenfeld stood out both as an individual involved in many organizations on campus and as a passionate and energetic student in the classroom.

“I’m not surprised that [Sittenfeld] chose a career that let him work with people in his home city,” Gleason said. “I know that Cincinnati is a very important place to him. It didn’t surprise me that he moved towards a career in which he felt he could make a difference in other people’s lives.”

After graduating from Princeton, Sittenfeld earned a master’s degree in English and American studies at the University of Oxford as a Marshall Scholar. He then returned to Cincinnati to work as assistant director for the Community Learning Center Institute, which helps to provide academic enrichment opportunities and other services to public school students.

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“What I came back home to Cincinnati to do was to to get involved building better, stronger schools for the next generation,” Sittenfeld said.

Sittenfeld was elected to the Cincinnati City Council in 2011. As a council member, Sittenfeld chairs the education and entrepreneurship committee.

USA Today described his role in transforming five Cincinnati schools into “community hubs” as his “biggest initiative.” The aim is for public schools to cultivate partnerships with “business, public and private agencies, higher education, neighborhood and faith-based groups” according to the Huffington Post.

The Huffington Post further reported that New York City was emulating the Cincinnati program.

“I really got an up-close look and saw that what government does can make a big difference in people’s lives,” Sittenfeld said.