The self-described working man challenged Democrat Barack Obama on his tax plan and emerged as an avatar of the middle class.
Mr. Wurzelbacher, an Ohio native and veteran of the plumbing trade, lived outside Toledo in the community of Holland when he was catapulted to fame in the final weeks of the White House race that pitted Obama, a U.S. senator from Illinois, against U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the Republican nominee.
“My attitude is that if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s going to be good for everybody,” Obama said. “If you’ve got a plumbing business, you’re going to be better off if you’ve got a whole bunch of customers who can afford to hire you, and right now everybody’s so pinched that business is bad for everybody.
The attention brought with it unflattering revelations, including that Mr. Wurzelbacher did not have a plumber’s license and that he owed $1,182 in back taxes in Ohio. Two years after the election, Mr. Wurzelbacher, still a sought-after figure in some conservative circles, reflected on Fox News about the effects of fame on his life.
In a 2009 interview with the publication Christianity Today, he remarked that he “had some friends that are actually homosexual” and that “they know that I wouldn’t have them anywhere near my children.”At a tea party event in 2010, referring to illegal immigration, he suggested that the United States “put a fence up and start shooting.”
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