A little more than two years ago, U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl was on the Mobile County Commission debating issues like the fate of a soccer complex in Mobile while duking it out with the Club For Growth as a fierce GOP primary was underway to claim the open 1st congressional district seat.

Now he’s a member of one of the most powerful committees on Capitol Hill.

Carl, 64, won the bruising primary election in 2020, and sailed to re-election last year with little opposition. Late last week, he was nominated by House Republican Leadership as a member to the U.S. House Appropriations Committee.

“I’m up for the challenge,” Carl said in an interview with AL.com Tuesday. “There are people on the steering committee who feel like I’m up for it. I did campaign for it. A lot of congressmen don’t want to be near Appropriations because they have to take hard votes on issues. There are social issues that will put me in the crosshairs on a lot of things, but we’ve got to get this country turned around.”

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Carl’s addition to Appropriations is the first time for a 1st congressional district lawmaker to serve on the powerful committee since former U.S. Rep. Jo Bonner served on it from 2008 until he retired in 2013. Before Bonner, former Congressman Sonny Callahan served on Appropriations and chaired its subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs after Republicans reclaimed the House during the 1994 midterms.

Carl said he was unsure which of the Appropriations subcommittees he will serve on since those appointments have yet to be made.

“The district has a history of appropriators,” Carl said. “Every one of these (subcommittees) on Appropriations will affect my district directly. We have the possibility of Airbus picking up the tanker contract, and the funding of the Coast Guard. It’s a natural blend. We have a little bit of everything.”

Former U.S. Rep. Bradley Byrne, who preceded Carl as the congressional representative in the 1st district and is now the president and CEO of the Mobile Chamber, said Carl’s committee assignment gives South Alabama representation on a committee that also includes U.S. Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Hayleyville.

Aderholt, who is now Alabama’s longest serving lawmaker in Washington after the retirement of Senator Richard Shelby, will chair the Labor, Health and Human Services & Education Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee.

“The delegation plays as a team, and you have Aderholt in North Alabama and Jerry supporting him,” said Byrne. “Carl understands the practicalities on what we need (in South Alabama) because he’s been working on it a very long time. This is a very important move for this entire region.”

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 Carl’s assignment is a “very big deal” because “very rarely do members with so little seniority get appointed” to Appropriations.

“Everybody sees what Shelby did as the top ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations and think, ‘well, that’s great’ and ‘maybe Jerry Carl will be able to bring back a ton of pork barrel projects and federal spending,’” said Hillyer. “But that’s not immediately necessarily the case. He will be a very junior member on a big committee. But it does at least get him at the table for legitimate projects for South Alabama.”

Hillyer said Carl’s involvement can be crucial in providing directives on how federal money should not be spent.

“What’s more important are the subtle ways that committee members can help,” said Hillyer. “By being at the table, and in the hearing room and at the late night sessions where Appropriation bills are marked up in granular detail, especially if you’re in the majority party, you will have the ear of the (committee’s) chairman to look after local interests.”

Hillyer added, “It might not be with spending new money, but it might also be how you either narrow or expand the definitions of existing money streams and how you can put language in saying that money shall not be spent in a certain way.”

Hillyer said Carl’s influence could be in objecting to Biden Administration regulations.

“An appropriations bill can mandate that no federal money be spent to enforce Regulation X or Regulation Y or Z,” Hillyer said. “As a member of Appropriations, you are in a much better position to get a half-sentence clause into a 300-page bill that says ‘no money can be spent to enforce this.’”

Carl said he plans to utilize his role to focus on what he says is “waste” in the federal government, and to look for ways to cut the federal budget.

“The appropriations for our district are huge, but it’s not necessarily what I can bring home but what can we do as far as focusing on waste,” said Carl.