Mike Hubbard had no idea when he first became a disk jockey at the age of 13 in Hartwell, Georgia, he would work for several football players’ Heisman campaigns — or become the speaker of Alabama’s House of Representatives.
Mike became the first Republican speaker in 136 years in 2010 after leading the state’s GOP to retake both houses of Congress for the first time since shortly after the Civil War. He mounted a massive political fundraising operation that he would eventually document in his 2012 book "Storming the State House: The Campaign That Liberated Alabama from 136 Years of Democrat Rule."
The Republican's campaign in 2010 painted the Alabama Democratic Party as a greedy, corrupt good-old-boys' club. Years before in 2007, the Democratically controlled Legislature voted themselves a 62-percent pay increase. Hubbard's Republican machine used the pay increase against the Democrats in 2010.
The state Democrats have yet to recover from the blows of the 2010 election.
When Hubbard was elected speaker, one of his first priorities was passing some of the toughest and most comprehensive ethics laws in the country. Those ethics laws would eventually come back to haunt Mike.
Mike was indicted in October 2014 by a Lee County Grand Jury for violating state ethics law. Hubbard would argue almost a year later that the same ethics laws he pushed through the House were unconstitutional.
The Auburn Republican has retained his position as House speaker, despite facing 23 counts of felony corruption charges and calls from his own caucus to step down. Jury selection for his high-profile trial began Monday, May 16. Opening statements are set for May 24, almost 19 months after he was indicted.
“I can’t talk about the specifics of it, but I can say that I’m not going to allow anything to be a distraction,” Mike said in an exclusive interview with The Auburn Plainsman in March. “I’m looking forward to having the truth come out.”
Mike has been serving in the Alabama House of Representatives since 1998 when he took the seat of former representative Pete Turnham, one of Alabama’s longest-serving congressmen.
Since the Republicans obtained a super majority in the Alabama Legislature, Hubbard has been described by many as the most powerful man in Alabama politics.
Mike said while he developed a passion for politics later in life, he has always loved media and sports.
After visiting a radio station near his hometown, Mike became enamored with radio broadcasting.
Mike said he then began covering sports for his junior high and high school newspapers soon thereafter.
“I loved sports, but I was not an athlete,” Mike said. “I had a very wise football coach who said, ‘I don’t think you need to be an athlete. I think you need to use your talents over (at the school newspaper).’”
He later received a scholarship for his work in sports journalism at his high school, among other things, he said.
“I ended up getting a scholarship to the University of Georgia to do (journalism),” Mike said. “I worked in media relations, or sports information back then. I lived in the athletic dormitories right next door to Herschel Walker. Terry Hoage was my college roommate.”
Mike then worked for both Hoage and Walker’s Heisman Trophy campaigns.
Walker’s was a successful one, and Hoage was named to the College Football Hall of Fame years later.
“I came here [to Auburn University] two weeks after graduation and worked for Bo Jackson’s Heisman campaign,” Mike said. “So I’ve been really fortunate to have worked for two successful Heisman campaigns — two really good athletes, world-class athletes.”
His time working in the Auburn athletics department was also when he fell in love with Susan Hubbard. Susan was the president of the Tigerettes, the athletic recruiting group, when they met and fell in love.
“Our first date was the Cotton Bowl Ball at the Cotton Bowl that year,” Susan said. “It’s really funny now. I got to know him, and we dated for a year and a half.”
Susan and Mike were married in August 1987. Susan is now the assistant dean of the College of Human Sciences at Auburn.
“We have a lot in common,” Susan said. “We’re both from small towns, our roots were very similar and our values and what we believed were very similar. He’s a wonderful person.”
Mike has been an Auburn resident since he moved to town for Jackson’s campaign.
He went on to produce Pat Dye’s television show and founded his own company, the Auburn Network Inc., in 1990.
The company won the rights to broadcast Auburn’s sporting events, but later sold those rights to International Sports Properties in 2003.
Hubbard still owns and operates the Auburn Network, which runs three local radio stations: NewsTalk WANI, Wings 94.3 and ESPN 106.5. Auburn Network also has an advertising subsidiary, among other components.
“What I enjoy the most is I’m the disk jockey on Saturday mornings on Wings 94.3,” Mike said. “From six until noon, I’m the DJ, and I’m playing the same music I played when I was in college: the greatest music ever made — Led Zeppelin, the Doobie Brothers, Aerosmith, Pat Benatar and The Cars.”
Updated Tuesday, May 17, 2016.
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