FLORENCE — Mike Wiley's mouth is as big as his political dreams.

        “I am a big mouth and the best way to find out what is going on in Washington is to send me,” Mr. Wiley said in a statement formally announcing his candidacy for Northern Kentucky's U.S. House seat.

        “Because when I find out what they are doing, you'll know.”

        Mr. Wiley of Florence is sending minor shock waves through the local Republican establishment by entering next year's GOP primary for the U.S. House seat now held by Boone County Democrat Ken Lucas.

        After more established Republicans such as state Sen. Katie Stine of Fort Thomas and state Rep. Jon Draud of Crestview Hills decided not to run against Mr. Lucas, Northern Kentucky's GOP leadership seemed to be coalescing behind Boone County businessman Geoff Davis.

        Mr. Davis, who operates a management consulting firm, has not yet officially entered the race but is expected to do so this summer.

        It's unclear how much Mr. Wiley can or will muddle the political waters for Mr. Davis, a Republican who has never held elective office but who has spent months meeting with GOP leaders and activists across the 22-county 4th District.

        But even though he's lived in the area for only about a year, Mr. Wiley, a former Democrat who ran for the U.S. Senate in Florida, said he will be a factor.

        “I've done this before,” Mr. Wiley said in an interview. “I did a lot of driving and talked to a lot of people. I know how to run a grass-roots campaign.

        “They don't count on how much money you have at the end of the race,” he said. “They count the votes.”

        Party leaders say they know little about Mr. Wiley.

        “I don't know that much about him,” said Damon Thayer, vice chairman of the Kentucky Republican Party.

        “But he switched to the Republican Party, so he can jump on in — the water's warm,” Mr. Thayer said.

        The campaign team for Mr. Lucas — the only Democrat in Kentucky's Washington delegation and a frequent voter with the GOP — has not commented on any potential Republican candidates.

        Marc Wilson, Mr. Davis' political and media adviser, also refused to say anything directly about Mr. Wiley.

        “Geoff Davis is getting organized,” Mr. Wilson said Monday. “And we are all about beating Ken Lucas and definitely showing people the Democrat he really is.”

        Raised in the Boston area, the “grandson and son of Teamsters”, Mr. Wiley, 48, holds an accounting degree from Bentley College in Waltham, Mass. A divorced father of two teen-age children, he moved to Florence about a year ago and works in business development for D.E. Fox and Associates, a Cincinnati construction firm.

        Mr. Wiley previously lived in Florida and was the host of a politically conservative talk radio show when he en tered the 1994 U.S. Senate primary against Hugh Rodham, the brother of former first lady and current Sen. Hillary Clinton.

        He lost the race but carried about half of Florida's counties. However, some of his stances could come back to haunt him in the 4th District race.

        For instance, Mr. Wiley claimed that the government is keeping secret information about UFOs and aliens. And to protest the federal government's foreign aid poli cies, he declared himself a “starving Rwandan” so he could ask for $1 million in foreign aid, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

        Mr. Wiley shrugs off those instances as publicity stunts. He says he is serious about his platform, which includes:

        • Abolishing all federal taxes on alcohol and tobacco.

        • Abolishing the Internal Revenue Service and implementing a 10 percent flat tax with a personal exemption of $25,000 a person.

        Asked to account for the shortfall of revenue the federal government would experience by collecting less taxes, Mr. Wiley gave a less specific answer about “reducing the size of government.”

        • Merging Medicare and Medicaid — federal government programs that provide health insurance to the elderly, poor and disabled — and finding a way to introduce more competition from private companies into the programs.

        “Anytime you want to improve the cost of anything,” he said, “you introduce competition.”

        • Opposing gun control legislation and abortion rights.

        Asked to name a Republican in national politics he admires, Mr. Wiley mentioned Pat Buchanan, a conservative commentator and writer who ran for president on the GOP and Reform Party tickets.

        He said he will beat Mr. Davis and Mr. Lucas by getting out in the district, appearing on local radio shows, advertising in small-town papers and “taking my campaign directly to the people.”

        “(Mr.) Lucas will have the power of money and the power of incumbency,” Mr. Wiley said.

        “I'll have the other three. The power of God, the power of the truth and the power of the people,” he said.

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