Washington – College senior Andrew Lee loves politics with an ardor many his age reserve for computer games or professional sports.
That difference struck the Colorado native one night as he quietly perused political blogs while his roommate shouted gleefully over his fantasy football. Lee realized he knew how to combine those seemingly incompatible interests.
Working with three friends at Claremont-McKenna College in California, Lee, 21, created the website fantasycongress.org, where players pick teams of members of Congress, then track their political performance as competitive sport.
Lee and his friends told their professors, who told the school’s publicity office.
In one day, Lee morphed from an unknown college student to a wunderkind talking on radio programs in the U.S., England and Australia. The New York Times wrote about the website. And on Monday, Fantasycongress had about 37,000 unique visitors from around the globe and 9,000 people had signed up to play. Of those, 100 reported that they are from Colorado.
“The hope is to be able to get people as excited about Congress as they are about football,” Lee said. Asked whether that’s a tall order, he mused, “Maybe I’m the only person who is as excited about the Broncos as I am about Sen. (Ken) Salazar.”
Lee became interested in politics as an adolescent, largely because of his mother’s confusion about a movie title.
Lee’s parents, Lui Sha and Lisha Ma Lee, emigrated from China and landed in Westminster. Lee was the only person of Chinese heritage at his school, and his mother, wanting to teach about his culture, brought home books and movies.
One of those movies was the detective story “Chinatown,” a murder-mystery set against the background of water politics.
“It obviously has nothing to do with Chinese people.” Lee said.
But it piqued his interest in politics. The self-described “nerdy Chinese kid with big glasses” ran for freshman class president at Lakewood High School. A student council seat also kept the student bullies at bay, he said.
Lee graduated in 2003 and went to Claremont-McKenna. He won a fellowship that paid him to work on a political campaign. He volunteered to help Salazar, then-state attorney general, win a U.S. Senate seat.
“That kid worked from dawn till dusk for us,” said Cody Wertz, spokesman for Salazar, D-Colo.
Today, Lee rattles off his future plans. He’s studying government and environmental policy and hopes to attend Oxford University for a master’s degree in science, then attend law school. Maybe he’ll work as a water-policy lawyer or a political aide. Maybe he’ll someday run for office.
Lee’s government professor, John Pitney, describes him as “a realistic idealist” who “knows that ideals don’t always guide the world, but for him that isn’t reason to give up hope.”
Lee’s website awards points to members of Congress based on their accomplishments, such as passing a bill or having an amendment added to a bill.
Salazar ranks 12th, the highest in Colorado’s delegation. He has received points for a number of successful amendments and for passing a bill. That bill was the naming of a post office. Lee wants to find a way to take into account the importance of bills.
Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., ranks 24th.
Staff writer Anne C. Mulkern can be reached at 202-662-8907 or amulkern@denverpost.com.
