Senator Richard Shelby secured $1.2 billion in earmarks for Alabama during his last two years in Congress. It’s an amount that continues to be viewed in awestruck tones by local officials.

The amount included more than $666 million in the fiscal 2023 omnibus package approved by Congress ahead of Christmas. No other lawmaker came close to matching Shelby, who earlier this month exited Capitol Hill after a 44-year career in Congress, the last 36 years in the Senate and with a reputation as a master appropriator.

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Now with the 118th Congress sworn in, the ghost of Shelby’s pork barrel prowess looms large over an Alabama delegation viewed as among the most inexperienced in the state’s recent memory as its members begin filing into new committee assignments.

If Shelby was Joe Montana, is there a Steve Young in the waiting?

Experts are not so sure.

“It’s like the Patriots now,” said Casey Burgat, legislative affairs program director at George Washington University. “The New England Patriots, that is. There is a recognition that this is what every other team feels like once Tom Brady left, and that you are not assumed a slot in the championship game.”

He added, “(Alabama) is experiencing what almost every state experiences, too. You are losing seniority and ranking membership and it’s being replaced by someone with less seniority and fewer relationships. And (Alabama) is going to feel a bit of a vacuum on the appropriations angle from Shelby retiring given how effective he was and longstanding leadership he had on the Appropriations Committee.”

Alabama’s congressional delegation also realizes it.

“No one will ever equal Richard Shelby,” said U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl, R-Mobile. “He will be a ghost in Congress for years to come.”

Aderholt and Rogers

Observers note that Alabama’s cupboard is not bare when it comes to congressional seniority, though it has completely shifted from the Senate to the state’s House delegation.

“For the first time in generations, the focus in Alabama will go from the Senate to the House because we have more seniority there,” said Bradley Byrne, a former congressman and current president and CEO of the Mobile Chamber.

The spotlight is now on the two Alabama House members with the most seniority.

“The slack has got to be picked up by Aderholt and Rogers,” said Jess Brown, a retired political science professor at Athens State University and a longtime observer of Alabama politics, referring to Republican Reps. Robert Aderholt of Haleyville and Mike Rogers of Saks.

Aderholt, a member of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, was named chairman of the Labor, Health Services & Education Subcommittee of Appropriations. The subcommittee’s role carries significant heft: It is responsible for oversight of the nation’s largest non-defense budget.

Rogers is chairman of the Armed Services Committee and is the first Alabama lawmaker to serve in that role. The committee holds influential sway in Alabama, where military funding is crucial to the defense contractors, military installations, and five bases present throughout the state.

The appointment was announced right after Rogers found himself in with the glare of the national spotlight earlier this month when he had an animated confrontation with Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz. The incident occurred toward the end of a multi-day debate over the appointment of California Rep. Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House.

Rogers, considered a mild-mannered lawmaker, was held back. Images of the incident have drawn scorn on social media and stirred mockery on talk shows.

Brown said he does not believe the episode will have “one iota” of an impact on how Rogers is viewed as chairman of the crucial committee.

“If one has a reputation for being a hot head, I don’t think it’s Rogers,” Brown said. “It was a good dose of political theater for the press.”

Aderholt’s role on Appropriations will be worth watching, Brown said. The Appropriations Chairwoman is Texas Republican Rep. Kay Granger, who is 80 and was first elected to the House in 1996. Aderholt, who is 57, is the dean of Alabama’s congressional delegation now that Shelby is retired. He, too, was first elected to Congress in 1996.

“He’s a dependable vote for leadership,” Brown said. “He’s not a firebrand. He periodically issues a press release that provides read meat to the Republican hardcore, but he’s basically that quiet submarine type who works in the deep waters to get things done.”

Quin Hillyer, a Mobile-based columnist for the Washington Examiner and a former aide to Louisiana Rep. Bob Livingston while he was chairman of Appropriations in the 1990s, said Aderholt’s chairmanship is “a big deal for Alabama.”

“The Biden Administration has been hostile to efforts of school choice, and public funding of scholarship programs,” he said. “This puts Aderholt in a position to protect Alabama’s opportunity scholarships and programs like that across the country. It gives him a chance to say, ‘hey, if you regulate it out of existence, we might put in some language saying ‘no, the money cannot be spent’ to impose these regulations.”

Appropriations, Judiciary, Oversight

Other lawmakers are touting their committee assignments. They include:

U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl, R-Mobile: Carl’s appointment to House Appropriations returns a lawmaker from Alabama’s 1st congressional district to the powerful committee for the first time in over a decade. Carl also said he hopes to return to Natural Resources committee, which is an important committee for South Alabama in addressing issues like the federal red snapper fishing season and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

Hillyer praised Carl’s assignment, saying it is a rarity for members “with so little seniority” to receive.

Rep. Gary Palmer, R-Hoover: Palmer rejoins the House Energy and Commerce Committee and the Committee on Oversight and Accountability, where he was chairman of the Intergovernmental Affairs Subcommittee. The committee is expected to be a key panel in investigating federal agencies and the Biden Administration, as well as Biden’s family.

“Now more than ever, the American people want Republicans in the House to hold the Biden Administration accountable for its actions that undermined the integrity of the executive branch,” he said, adding that he believes Republicans on the Oversight Committee will “shine a light” on the administration.

Rep. Barry Moore, R-Enterprise. Moore joins the House Judiciary Committee that is chaired by Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan and is expected to be a high-profile group aimed at investigating President Biden’s handling of classified documents and the Justice Department’s investigation into it. Moore was elected to Congress in 2020. He will retain his seat on the House Agriculture Committee, which will be charged with considering a new five-year farm bill.

“The Judiciary Committee will be the tip of the spear this Congress fighting to ensure that the American people’s government work to protect their civil liberties, not undermine them to advance a political agenda,” he said.

Rep. Dale Strong, R-Huntsville. Strong, the newly elected freshman lawmaker, will join the Armed Services Committee chaired by Rogers. He was also appointed to the Committee on Homeland Security.

Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Birmingham. Democratic committee assignments have not been made official. Sewell, who has been in the House since 2011, has served on the House Ways and Means Committee, the oldest U.S. House committee, has responsibilities for overseeing taxes, tariffs and other revenue enhancing measures.

Focus on Britt

With Shelby retired, the attention will shift in the coming week to the committee assignments dished out to his former chief of staff and freshman Senator Katie Britt.

“She likely learned a bit in her years working for Shelby,” said Sarah Binder, senior fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a professor of political science at George Washington University. “But whether Britt makes bringing federal spending back to Alabama her top priority remains to be seen, especially in a year when Republicans – at least in the House – are threatening to pare back domestic spending considerably.”

Related: Katie Britt among growing millennial ranks of Congress: Baby Boomers no longer the majority

Byrne said he anticipates good things happening for Britt, whom he says will “move up rapidly” through the upper chamber.

“I know everyone in Alabama would like Senator Britt to get on Appropriations and I think she probably will, but we will have to wait and see,” Byrne said, referring to the powerful committee that Shelby presided as chairman and as a ranking member in recent years.

The roles enabled him to secure billions of dollars in federal funding for Alabama’s universities and research centers, the state port authority, military installations, hospitals, economic development, FBI branches and more.

“Losing that chairmanship will have a huge impact on what goes back to the state,” said Burgat at George Washington University. “That’s a unique position on a supremely powerful committee that allowed for an ability to earmark funds for constituencies and projects for states. He was obviously good on that.”

Shelby’s influence

Burgat said that even with Aderholt and Rogers rising in seniority in the House, it pales in comparison to a senator’s seniority and especially one like Shelby who crafted a reputation as Capitol Hill’s master appropriator.

Related: How U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby brought home the bacon, in style

“They are one of 437 instead of 1 of 100,” said Burgat. “It’s power in numbers. Will those House members have impact? Yes, they will with Rogers in charge of Armed Services and Aderholt. But they won’t be able to fill the shoes left by the retirement of Shelby given the longstanding relationship he had with senators on Capitol Hill and his ability to pass a budget.”

Alabama’s other Senator Tommy Tuberville ranks 89th in seniority. He has served on the Senate Armed Forces Committee, Veterans Affairs and the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry.

Brown, the retired professor at Athens State University, said it’s the first time in 43 years since Alabama has had two senators serving at the same time with a limited amount of seniority. Four decades ago, Democratic Senator Howell Heflin began his Senate tenure in 1978, while Republican Senator Jeremiah Denton began serving in 1980.

But seniority aside, Shelby’s retirement is likely going to mean that Alabama is going to receive a much smaller amount of federal money returning to the state for the foreseeable future, experts says.

“Shelby in many ways was a relic of a different Republican Party,” said Binder, noting that Shelby was once a Southern conservative Democrat. “The vibe of today’s GOP, especially in the South, is far more focused on ideologically-charged issues – both economic and social.”

She added, “I’m tempted to say that Senator Shelby was one of a kind in terms of his ability to direct federal funds back to his home state.”