Cassie Felder, a Republican lawyer, hopes to represent the constituents of Louisiana’s sixth district, just as she’s represented small businesses through her law firm in Baton Rouge since 2010.
Felder, who is running for the U.S. House of Representatives, grew up in Hammond, where her parents started a collision parts business when she was 10. She began working for her parents at the age of 12, “doing whatever they needed me to do.”
By the time she was 15, Felder said she was practically managing a large number of her parent’s employees. Felder said her experiences growing up in a family-owned business shaped many of her current values.
“I developed a lot of management skills, learning a lot about what works and what doesn’t work,” Felder said. “You learn quickly that it’s hard to be friends with the people that work for you.”
While at Tulane University Law School, Felder became interested in tax law, enjoying the “mental gymnastics” it demands of a lawyer. After receiving her Master of Laws from Boston University, Felder dove into the New Orleans job market in 2001.
After spending two and a half years at a firm in the Texas, Felder and her husband decided it was time to return home.
“We missed crawfish boils and the people and our families,” Felder said. “My husband and I desperately missed south Louisiana.”
After roughly 18 months of working for a large firm in New Orleans, Felder said she began to “feel the need to do my own thing.”
“I wanted to appeal to the businesses that I wanted to appeal to, do the things I wanted to do and support the kinds of businesses and people I wanted to support,” Felder said.
In Feb. 2010, Felder opened her own law firm in Baton Rouge.
Felder currently describes herself as a business lawyer who represents businesses from their “formation to termination.”
Since Felder announced her run for Congress, her husband, Matt, has taken over the administrative aspects of Felder’s firm.
According to Felder, her decision to relinquish power at the firm and run for Congress was not easy.
When Rep. Bill Cassidy announced he would not seek reelection, Felder said she began approaching local business people in her area, encouraging them to run. However, Felder said “the finger kept getting pointed back at me.”
After conferring with her husband, Felder decided to pursue a congressional run.
“We just decided instead of me spending all this time screaming at the television, telling Republicans how they should be answering questions, I should be the one answering the questions,” Felder said.
Felder does not feel her lack of political experience will affect her chances in the race, and she prides herself on not being a career politician.
“So many people are ready for a change,” Felder said. “They are ready for people who are not concerned with their next election.”
Felder said she views her candidacy as a positive step forward for the Republican Party, noting that the GOP is trying to refocus its approach toward women voters by attempting to attract more female candidates.
“The Republican Party is not really attracting women to run,” Felder said. “The Democrats seem to do that and do it fairly well.”
Felder, married since 2000, said she is a proponent of traditional marriage, and she thinks her view on the issue of abortion sets her apart from the other candidates.
“It all goes back to having your governance be at a local level rather than a federal level, leaving more decisions to the people in their individual capacities, and leaving more money in their pockets to do with it what they want,” Felder said. “When you restore liberty and freedom to the individual, people will become much more involved in their communities and will reach out to women who are at a state of crisis in their lives.”
When it comes to issues of higher education, Felder said she will “fight to keep the federal government out of education as much as possible.”
Felder is a member of the NRA, and attended a concealed weapons class on Jan. 25.
On the subject of gun-related violence, Felder said she does not think the answer is more gun control.
“I think that allowing for teachers and principals to arm themselves, to protect themselves and the children that are in their classrooms, would probably put a stop to this pretty quickly,” Felder said.
Though Felder said she is running for Congress to win, she acknowledges that representing clients is her true passion.
“This is something I hope to be able to do for a couple of terms and then be able to pass the baton and get back to what it is I consider to be my career,” Felder said.