Chris Clark has a full-time job at a big law firm and two-year-old twins. So presumably he had enough on his plate even before the EF3 tornado that ripped through St. Louis on May 16 destroyed his condo. As it turns out, he didn’t: Just a few months later, he announced a run for the Missouri Senate.
Clark, 36, has thrown his hat into the race for state Senate District 4, a seat being vacated by the term-limited Sen. Karla May (D-St. Louis). He is by far the youngest and the least known of the three Democratic candidates (says one of them, state Rep. Steve Butz, “When I say no one’s heard of him, I mean no one has heard of him”). But compared to facing the wreckage of a tornado, stumping for votes as a first-time candidate should feel like a snap.
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A former Fulbright scholar and prosecutor in the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office, Clark says he was planning a run even before the tornado, but that the aftermath increased his sense of purpose. “I think the area of the city that we’re in did a remarkable job of coming together and supporting each other,” he says. “It underscored this sense of community and a bigger purpose to things. That may sound cheesy, but it’s also really inspiring and a source of motivation to do more meaningful work.”
Nevertheless, the last few months have been stressful. Before the tornado, “home” was a three-story, six-unit brick building on Waterman Blvd. in the city’s DeBaliviere Place neighborhood. “Our neighbors across the hall from us were Chinese immigrants,” Clark says. “We had a Jamaican family in the building. We had an Indian family in the building, and it was always just a very cool environment.”
The tornado changed that. As it ripped through the neighborhood, the condo lost its roof. It later suffered serious water damage and remains condemned. Adding to the difficulty in getting it fixed, many of the unit owners were grossly underinsured, or didn’t necessarily have the right kind of insurance, Clark says.
For Clark and his wife, a physician, who knew they needed a home for their two young children, the best option seemed to be buying another house—ASAP. “We really didn’t have the luxury of taking our time to figure out what the next thing was going to be,” he says. They landed in the Clayshire neighborhood of Clayton, and from there, are working to help their old neighbors as best they can.
Of the issues facing condo associations in the storm’s aftermath, Clark says, “It’s a massive, massive area of need. I’m doing what I can with my own personal contacts and my HOA. But it’s piecemeal, and I think there needs to be some sort of option that’s more proactive and broad.”
Clark is running on the issue of housing affordability, as well as safe streets, good schools (he’s anti-voucher), and protecting reproductive freedom. That final issue could be a major issue in the race. Clark’s position contrasts with Butz, who has long drawn criticism from his fellow Democrats for his nuanced stance on abortion. Butz tells SLM that he believes former state Rep. Gina Mitten (D-St. Louis), who is also a declared candidate for Senate District 4, was drawn to the race because of his position. “I’m in that gray area where I’m not pro-life enough for the pro-lifers, and I’m not pro-choice,” he says. “I always think I’m in where 70 percent of all Missourians are, but, yeah, if this is your only issue either way, I’m probably not your guy.”
Asked about her candidacy, Mitten brings up abortion almost immediately, saying she’s running because of Butz’s history of anti-abortion votes. “If you look at the numbers, 80 percent of Senate District 4 voted in favor of Amendment 3 last fall,” she says. “I do not feel at all comfortable being represented by somebody that doesn’t support any woman’s and including my own daughter’s right to have control over her reproductive destiny.”
Butz notes that the district changed considerably after redistricting in 2022. What used to be mostly in the city now has a pool of voters that’s roughly half in the city and half in the county. Mitten, a former Richmond Heights councilwoman, along with Clark and his new home in Clayton, may be able to draw from those voters. Says Butz, “He strikes me as someone who will be a serious candidate.”
Mitten is less gracious. She stresses her long history of community involvement (beyond her time on the city council and in the legislature, she’s currently the Democratic committeewoman). “By the time I was elected to the House, I had well-documented, solid experience,” she says. “I unequivocally empathize with anyone who lost anything in the tornado. … But Democrats only have 10 members in the Missouri state Senate. And I don’t think that it’s appropriate to have somebody without any political experience, organizing experience, legislative experience. I don’t think that the Missouri state Senate is the place to put on training wheels.”
Butz dominates cash on hand: As of July 15, he had $133,000. Mitten reported $57,000 in the same period. But in his first report, filed this week, Clark was able to show $45,000 in donations—an eye-catching total for a first-time candidate. Even so, he knows it will be an uphill battle.
Says Clark, “We need all the attention we can get.”
