Clyde Holloway

Clyde Cecil Holloway
Louisiana Public Service Commissioner
In office 2009–2016
Preceded by	Dale Sittig
Succeeded by	Mike Francis
U.S. Representative for Louisiana's 8th congressional district (since disbanded)
In office January 3, 1987 – January 3, 1993
Preceded by	Catherine Small Long
Succeeded by	District abolished through redistricting
Born	November 28, 1943 Lecompte, Rapides Parish, Louisiana
Died	October 16, 2016 (aged 72) Forest Hill, Louisiana
Resting place	Butters Cemetery in Forest Hill
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Catherine F. "Cathie" Holloway (born 1943)
Children	Timothy A. Holloway (b. 1969) Mark R. Holloway (b. 1971) Rebecca L. Holloway (b. 1975) Sara E. Holloway (b. 1979) Parents: James Cecil and Ever Christina Barker Holloway
Residence	Forest Hill, Louisiana
Occupation	Clyde Holloway's Nursery (still in operation)
Religion	Southern Baptist

Clyde Cecil Holloway (November 28, 1943 – October 16, 2016) was a Republican who served as one of five members of the Louisiana Public Service Commission from April 2009 until his death in office. He was earlier a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1987 to 1993 for the since defunct Alexandria-based 8th congressional district. He was the first Republican in the 20th century to represent the northern part of his state in Congress.

Holloway won three consecutive elections to the U.S. House from a historically Democrat district. He finishede in fourth place in the 1991 gubernatorial primary. After redistricting in 1992, the 8th district was abolished and he ran in the adjoining 6th congressional district against fellow Republican Richard Hugh Baker. He narrowly lost the runoff. He ran unsuccessful campaigns in 1994 for the 7th congressional district, since disbanded, and the 5th congressional district in 1996 and again in 2002 and for Lieutenant Governor in 2003.

Holloway served as Louisiana state director for the Office of Rural Development in the United States Department of Agriculture from October 2006 to January 2009. Then he ran in April 2009 in a special election for the Louisiana Public Service Commission]] in which he was victorius. He was re-elected unopposed to the public service commission in 2010. Holloway was also a former member of the Louisiana Republican State Central Committee for the 27th representative district.

On August 21, 2013, Holloway filed to run in Louisiana's 5th congressional district special election following the resignation of Congressman Rodney Alexander. Holloway came in fourth in the nonpartisan blanket primary. Holloway's name has appeared twelve times on a Louisiana congressional ballot. He first ran for Congress in 1980, won his first term in 1986, and last ran in 2014. He ran in four different congressional districts and won three of eleven races for the U.S. House, two of which required runoffs.

On August 22, 2014, Holloway filed in the remaining minutes available to run in the nonpartisan blanket primary for the regular 5th congressional district election held on November 4. This marked his fifth attempt to return to Congress since his defeat in 1992. He finished fifth in the contest with 17,875 votes (7.5 percent). The short-term incumbent, Vance McAllister, whom Holloway had endorsed in the special election runoff in 2013, finished fourth with 26,605 votes (11.1 percent). The race was then won by physician Ralph Abraham of Richland Parish, who defeated the then mayor of Monroe, Jamie Mayo, an African American and the only Democrat in the running for a seat that was once so Democratic that Republicans did not even bother to contest it.

Early life and career

Holloway is one of seven children born in the small town of Lecompte in south Rapides Parish to James Cecil Holloway (October 15, 1909 – September 26, 2006), formerly from Arizona, and the former Ever Christina Barker (December 7, 1912 – December 11, 2006). The Holloways later moved to Forest Hill just west of Lecompte and south of Alexandria, the largest city in central Louisiana. James Holloway earned his livelihood as an electrician at Camp Claiborne and was later employed at the Meeker Sugar Cooperative. He retired as a bus driver for Rapides Parish public schools. The senior Holloways were married for seventy-one years; he preceded her in death by some ten weeks. Mrs. Holloway was the daughter of Charlie and Emma Barker. The Holloways are interred at Butters Cemetery in Forest Hill.

Clyde Holloway attended the National Aeronautics School in Kansas City, Kansas. His Clyde Holloway Nursery is one of the oldest and largest commercial horticultural nurseries in Forest Hill. It generates some $2 million in annual gross recepits.

Another nurseryman in Forest Hill, Robert W. Bates, was a former agent of the United States Secret Service.

Holloway is a former chairman of the board of the private Forest Hill Academy, originally known as Forest Hill Neighborhood School.

He and his wife, Catherine F. "Cathie" Holloway (also born 1943), have four children, Timothy A. Holloway (born 1969), Mark R. Holloway (born 1971), Rebecca L. Holloway (born 1975), and Sara E. Holloway (born 1979), and five grandchildren. Holloway was a member of the Elwood Baptist Church in Forest Hill, but Mrs. Holloway is Roman Catholic; the children were reared in the Catholic faith. One of his brothers, Charlie David Holloway (born 1941), is a former member of the Rapides Parish School Board.

U.S. House of Representatives

1980 election

Holloway first ran for Congress in 1980 against Democratic incumbent Gillis Long. Holloway depicted himself as a Reaganite, a conservative, and an opponent of Republican United States District Court Judge Nauman Steele Scott (1916-2001), who issued sweeping cross-parish school busing orders. The directives effectively destroyed the local public school, a nucleus and critical unifying factor in their small rural town of Forest Hill. Holloway summarized his opposition to forced busing by pointing out that "parents of both black and white children opposed the forced busing, and he saw the fight as essentially being about the "right of a small, rural community like Forest Hill to exist." Robert Henry Mitchell (born 1945), also of Forest Hill, the Republican loser to Long in the 1978 race, ran again. Long prevailed with 75,433 votes (68.9 percent) to Holloway's 27,816 (25.4 percent) and Mitchell's 6,243 (5.7 percent).

As it turned out, Holloway was laying the groundwork in the 1980 campaign for his eventual three elections to the U.S. House. Holloway and Long were both residents of Rapides Parish; so many were surprised when Holloway actually defeated the long-time powerful incumbent Long in their home parish.

In January 1981, Holloway, along with State Representative Woody Jenkins, an unsuccessful candidate for the U.S. Senate on three occasions, spoke at a rally in Alexandria to voice support of two proposed constitutional amendments, which never came to fruition. One sought to ban forced school busing for purposes of racial integration. Another called for the election of federal judges, rather than appointment by the president and confirmation by the U.S. Senate. At the rally, Holloway said "the only way Americans can turn around and go in the right direction is if middle-class people like us will show ... how we feel."

1985 special election

In 1985, Gillis Long died on the day of Reagan's second inauguration. A special election was held on March 30 to fill out his term, and Holloway entered the race as the lone Republican candidate. Long's widow, Catherine Small Long (1924-2019) and Alexandria attorney Jock Scott, a state representative in his third and final term, also ran. "Cathy" Long, a native of Dayton, Ohio, was a landslide winner, with 59,836 votes (55.4 percent). Scott finished second with 26,573 (24.6 percent), and Holloway trailed with 17,920 votes (16.6 percent).

Bill Dodd, an astute observer of Louisiana politics, called Cathy Long "the perfect political wife." She once told The Alexandria Town Talk that a U.S. representative's main responsibility is to bring as much national funding home to the congressional district as possible, a view at odds with those conservatives who abhor pork-barrel spending. She did not seek the seat for a full term in 1986.

1986 election

Holloway pictured during his congressional tenure

In 1986, in his third attempt to gain a seat in Congress, Holloway was the lone Republican in the nonpartisan blanket primary to succeed Mrs. Long in the majority African-American district. His principal opponent was E. Faye Williams, an African-American woman attorney from Alexandria born in 1941 who supported abortion and expanded federal social programs. Had she won, Williams would have been the first African American to represent Louisiana in the U.S. House since Reconstruction.

The other contenders were Morgan Goudeau, state Senator Joe Sevario of Prairieville in Ascension Parish, and Carson K. Killen, of St. Amant, also in Ascension Parish. Killen had been an aide to Gillis Long and had been groomed as Long's long-term successor. Killen was later elected to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education and was the executive director of the Louisiana Police Jury Association (the equivalent of a county commission in other states). Williams led Holloway in the primary, 46,025 (26 percent) to 41,618 (23 percent), a margin of 4,407 votes. Goudeau was third with 36,304 ballots (20 percent), followed by Sevario with 34,847 votes (19 percent), and Killen with 21,116 votes (11.8 percent).

Polls indicated that Williams would defeat Holloway in the general election in part because the district was 90 percent historically Democratic. High turnout, particularly in the large black community, was expected to benefit Williams. Holloway, however, pulled an upset. He received 102,276 votes (51.4 percent) to Williams' 96,864 (48.6 percent). He was heavily dependent on his native Rapides and neighboring Avoyelles parishes.

Holloway was estimated to have received 73 percent of the ballots of whites and 1 percent of the black vote. Williams would presumably have won if she had received 29 or 30 percent of the white vote, instead of the 27 percent that she obtained. Williams was damaged by reports that while previously living as a community organizer in Los Angeles, California, her estranged black husband, a news reporter, had murdered a white man, a college professor and radio announcer with whom he believed Williams was romantically involved. Holloway appeared to play into the racialized politics, giving an interview on the eve of the election that discussed Dr. Williams' violent assault and suggested that she was a communist.

In the same election cycle that Holloway was elected to the U.S. Congress, another Republican, Richard Hugh Baker of Baton Rouge, won a House seat to succeed the Republican William Henson Moore, who ran instead unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate against the Democrat John Breaux. Holloway and Baker would be only the fourth and fifth Republicans to have served in the U.S. House from Louisiana since Reconstruction, following David C. Treen in 1973, Henson Moore in 1975 and Bob Livingston in 1977. However, Holloway and Baker were only the second and third Republicans to win an undisputed victory in a contested election. Holloway was also the first Republican to represent a portion of North Louisiana since Reconstruction.

1988 election

In 1988, Williams and Holloway, as the two leaders in the primary, again squared off in the general election. Holloway was helped in the second round of voting by the presence of the successful Republican presidential nominee, Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush, who won the state by a comfortable margin. This time, Holloway defeated Williams, 116,241 votes (56.8 percent) to her 88,564 (43.2 percent). After her defeats, Williams left Alexandria and relocated to Washington, D.C. Other candidates in the 1988 primary were former Alexandria Mayor John K. Snyder, who received only 1,205 votes (less than 1 percent), as his controversial political career continued to unravel, and former Lieutenant Governor Robert Freeman, who received 14,814 votes (11 percent).

1990 election

In 1990, Holloway defeated two state senators in the primary, Cleo Fields, an African American from Baton Rouge, and the previously mentioned Joe McPherson, Jr., of Holloway's own Rapides Parish. Holloway polled 113,607 votes (56.4 percent) to 59,511 (29.6 percent) for Fields, and 28,170 (14 percent) for McPherson. Oddly though McPherson had won many elections for state senator, he lost both congressional and Public Service Commission races to Holloway, who had won fewer than half of the contests which he has entered.

1991 gubernatorial election

Holloway's three consecutive House victories, two with more than 55 percent of the vote, made him feel secure in running for governor in 1991; he could run statewide in an off-year from congressional races without surrendering his House seat. He won the endorsement of state Republican delegates against the sitting Republican governor, Buddy Roemer, who had been elected as a Democrat in 1987 in the primary. In the 1991 primary, Holloway finished fourth, with 82,683 (5.3 percent). One reason that Holloway supporters rejected Roemer was the outgoing governor's support for abortion. Previously considered pro-life, Roemer reversed himself and vetoed three bills which would have restricted access to abortion in Louisiana. Two decades later, Roemer made a bid for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination but polled few primary votes and then left the Republican Party, only to later return to the GOP.

Instead, the 1991 gubernatorial general election featured unendorsed Republican David Duke and former Governor Edwin Edwards. Holloway refused to endorse either Duke or Edwards, who won a landslide victory for a fourth term in part because the third-place candidate, Roemer, endorsed Edwards in the showdown with Duke, who was unpopular because of his Ku Klux Klan ties to the "Radical Right."

1992 election

After his gubernatorial loss, Holloway mapped plans in 1992 to seek re-election to Congress. Louisiana lost a congressional district as a result of the 1990 census, and Holloway's Alexandria-based 8th district was eliminated. His home in Forest Hill was drawn into a revised 6th district stretching from Baton Rouge on the south to Alexandria on the north. He faced two opponents, fellow Republican Representative Richard Baker and the Democratic mayor of Alexandria, Edward Gordon "Ned" Randolph, Jr. Holloway led in the nonpartisan blanket primary with 52,012 votes (37 percent) to Baker's 46,990 (33 percent), and Randolph's 42,819 (30 percent).

In the general election held on the day of the presidential election, Holloway won fifteen of seventeen parishes in the new district. However, Baker polled such majorities in the two largest parishes, Livingston and East Baton Rouge. That was enough for Baker to win the seat, 123,953 votes (50.6 percent) to Holloway's 121,225 (49.5 percent). Had Holloway been able to hold down Baker's margin in Baker's home parish of East Baton Rouge, he would have secured a fourth House term.

The 6th congressional district had been drawn so that the winner was likely to have been a Republican. Black residents of the surrounding area had been placed into the then majority African-American 4th congressional district, but only temporarily. (Ironically, that district was won by Cleo Fields, Holloway's unsuccessful opponent in 1990.) Tens of thousands of Democrats in the once historically Democratic 6th district were forced through the nonpartisan blanket primary to choose between two Republican candidates for Congress or to skip that race on the ballot. Baker was less conservative than Holloway, but Democratic voters apparently saw him as the lesser of two evils. Such a dilemma for Democrats was not what Edwards had in mind when he fashioned the nonpartisan blanket primary some fifteen years earlier. Edwards had generally expected Republicans to be sitting on the sidelines and having to choose from two unacceptable Democrats.

Tenure

In the U.S. House, Holloway was considered a "protectionist" and an opponent of "free trade" policies, which he believed to have contributed to economic troubles in Louisiana. Unlike Long, however, he was an ardent fiscal and social conservative. He voted to cut government spending. He was skeptical of international organizations that he felt undermined American sovereignty. His voting record consistently reflected his middle-class beliefs. He advocated rolling back "big government" by cutting taxes and also wanted to restore school prayer and to end abortion.

Attempted comebacks

1994 congressional election

Holloway waged further determined campaigns to return to Congress. In the heavily Republican year of 1994, he moved to the Lafayette-based 7th congressional district in southwestern Louisiana to oppose Democratic Representative Jimmy Hayes. Hayes polled 72,424 votes (53 percent) to Holloway's 54,253 (39.7 percent). Another 7.3 percent of voters supported a candidate who ran under the "No Party" option. Hayes surprised many observers by becoming a Republican himself the next year.

1996 congressional election

In 1996, Holloway entered the race for the again revised 5th district, which covers the northeast quadrant of Louisiana, stretching to south of Alexandria to include his Forest Hill residence. Holloway ran third in the primary to fellow Republican John Cooksey, a Monroe ophthalmologist, and current Democratic State Representative and formerly state Senator Francis C. Thompson, a large landowner in Delhi in Richland Parish.

Cooksey polled 60,853 ballots (34 percent) to Holloway's 48,226 (27 percent). Thompson, with 50,144 votes (28 percent), hence went into the 1996 general election with Cooksey. Two other Republican candidates, Ben Marshall and Tim Robinson, polled more than 12,000 critical primary votes, some potentially at Holloway's expense. Holloway's weak showing in Ouachita Parish, fewer than five thousand votes, kept him from proceeding to the second round of balloting, just as his weak showing in East Baton Rouge Parish had doomed him in 1992. Thwarted once more, Holloway endorsed Cooksey, with whom he shared a similar conservative philosophy, and helped him to raise money. Cooksey in turn won the seat handily, 135,990 (58.3 percent) to the more liberal Thompson's 97,363 (41.7 percent). Cooksey served three terms in the U.S. House.

2002 congressional election

When Cooksey decided to run for the U.S. Senate against Democrat Mary Landrieu in 2002, Holloway entered the race to succeed him in the House. For a time, Holloway appeared strong. He had the support of the U/S/ House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois, and the then Majority Whip, Tom DeLay of Texas. But he finished third in the nonpartisan blanket primary with 42,573 votes (23 percent). Leading the pack was the eventual winner, Democrat Rodney Alexander, with 52,952 votes (29 percent). Newcomer Dewey Lee Fletcher, a Republican advertising entrepreneur from Monroe, who had previously been an aide to Cooksey and died early in life, finished second in the primary with 45,278 (25 percent). A switch of 2,705 votes from Fletcher to Holloway would have placed Holloway in the second round of balloting against Alexander. A fourth candidate, Republican State Senator Robert J. Barham of Oak Ridge in Morehouse Parish, had 34,533 votes (19 percent). Three other candidates shared the remaining but critical 9,000 votes (5 percent).

Alexander defeated Fletcher in the general election by only 974 votes, 86,718 (50.3 percent) to 85,744 (49.7 percent). Holloway's unexpected endorsement of Alexander may have been the decisive movement of the campaign: he could not be Congressman again, but he could choose between the two general election candidates and anoint the narrow winner. There were also reports cited as the "Clyde Factor" that many Holloway supporters in Rapides Parish, particularly Alexandria, voted for Alexander primarily to thwart young Fletcher, given Fletcher's negative and misleading campaign tactics the final hours leading to the primary election.

The seat stayed in Democratic hands for less than two years, however. In the summer of 2004, Alexander switched to the Republican Party only minutes before the filing deadline. He thus deprived Holloway or any other serious challenger, of a chance to run against him in that year's election. It was Holloway's rival from 1985, Jock Scott, a Democrat-turned-Republican, who decided to take on Alexander that year but with little promise.

2003 Lieutenant Governor election

In 2003, Holloway ran for Lieutenant Governor but was defeated by the Democrat Mitch Landrieu, younger brother of Senator Mary Landrieu and son of former Mayor Moon Landrieu. Holloway originally ran on an intraparty ticket with the then-chairman of the PSC, Jay Blossman, of suburban St. Tammany Parish. When Blossman withdrew from the gubernatorial race in light of weak poll numbers, Holloway remained a candidate for Lieutenant Governor. He polled 249,668 votes (19 percent) to Landrieu's 674,803 (53 percent). The other 28 percent was shared by several other candidates, including the late African-American businessman Kirt Bennett of Baton Rouge and Melinda Schwegmann, a former Democratic Lieutenant Governor (1992–1996) who was serving as a state representative when she switched in 2003 to the Republican Party. Announcing his candidacy only one month prior to the election and spending less than $10,000, Holloway still scored majorities in Caldwell, LaSalle, and West Carroll parishes, which are all sparsely populated areas in north Louisiana. He also scored pluralities in Avoyelles and Evangeline parishes, both from his defunct 8th congressional district.

Rural Development Director

On October 19, 2006, Holloway was named Louisiana state director for the Office of Rural Development in the United States Department of Agriculture. In making the appointment, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns, currently a U.S. Senator from Nebraska, said that Holloway, who had been a member of the House Agriculture Committee during his six years in Congress, "brings a wealth of knowledge to USDA." The agency seeks to increase economic opportunity and to improve the quality of life in rural communities. The agency has invested some $72 billion since 2001 to provide equity and technical assistance to finance and foster growth in homeownership, business development, and critical community and technology infrastructure. The agency claims to have created or saved some 1.2 million jobs nationwide. The Holloway appointment expired on January 20, 2009, with the incoming Barack Obama administration.

Public Service Commissioner

In 2009, Holloway emerged the plurality leader in a special election for the Public Service Commission post vacated by the resignation of Dale Sittig of Eunice. The other candidate in the runoff, which had been scheduled for May 2, Democratic state Senator Joe McPherson, of Woodworth, formerly from Pineville, no longer a legislator, dropped out on April 13. Holloway narrowly led a three-candidate field in the special election held on April 4. McPherson had lost the previous regular PSC election to Sittig. Democrat-turned-Republican Gil Pinac, a hospital administrator and a former state representative from Crowley in Acadia Parish, finished a weak third in the April 4 balloting. McPherson explained his concession as an anticipation that most of Pinac's supporters would switch to Holloway and give the Republican an insurmountable lead. Holloway polled 32,258 votes (43.5 percent) to McPherson's 31,610 (42.63 percent). Pinac trailed with the critical 10,280 ballots (13.86 percent). McPherson's greatest strength was in populous Calcasieu Parish, where he led with 11,178 (50.4 percent) to Holloway's 7,873 (35.5 percent), and Pinac's 3,127 (14.1 percent). Ironically, Holloway's tabulation in Calcasieu – centered on Lake Charles – was also his single greatest parish total. Rapides Parish, the home of both candidates, voted in a low turnout: 6,527 for Holloway to 5,327 for McPherson, and 791 for Pinac.

As results were still being tabulated, Pinac conceded and endorsed Holloway. Republican Governor Jindal had raised funds for the Democrat McPherson, but had otherwise been silent on the PSC race.

Numerous people described McPherson, a businessman, as "anti-business", and the state Republican Party endorsed Holloway. Thus the runoff would have pitted the Republican committee's pick, Holloway, against the beneficiary of Republican Governor Bobby Jindal's fundraising largesse, McPherson. By withdrawing from the runoff, McPherson removed a political embarrassment for Jindal. Meanwhile, the Jindal-endorsed Lee Domingue lost the special election for a state Senate seat on April 4 to another Republican, Dan Claitor, scion of the Claitor's Publishing Company of Baton Rouge.

In replacing Democrat Sittig, Holloway's addition to the PSC gave the body its first-ever Republican majority. Commissioners Scott Angelle and Eric Skrmetta are, like Holloway, Republican; and the PSC has just five seats. The Democratic PSC members are Foster Lonnie Campbell, Jr., of Bossier City (an unsuccessful gubernatorial candidate against Jindal in 2007) and Lambert C. Boissiere, III. The PSC is also the first electoral body in Louisiana to develop a Republican majority since Reconstruction.

Holloway was unopposed for a full term on the PSC in the nonpartisan blanket primary held on August 28, 2010. On July 13, 2010, Holloway noted as a guest on The Moon Griffon Show, based in Monroe, that the August 28 contest was his first ever unopposed race and his thirteenth time but not yet the last to appear on a ballot. Holloway was presumably tabulating years in which he had runoff elections for Congress, 1986 and 1992, for instance, as one election.

2013 congressional election

Holloway surprised political observers on August 21, 2013, when he filed to run in the special election in the 5th congressional district held on October 19, to choose a successor to Republican Rodney Alexander, who resigned from Congress on September 26. Holloway said that his candidacy for the seat was motivated by suspicions that Alexander and Governor Bobby Jindal were trying to engineer the election of Republican state Senator Neil Riser, now a state representative from Columbia in Caldwell Parish to succeed Alexander, who became the director of the Louisiana Department of Veterans Affairs in the Jindal administration. Holloway said: "This thing stinks ... I feel like we tried to have an appointed congressman by the governor and by Rodney... Without any doubt, I think they've been orchestrating this for months."

Early in the campaign, Holloway endorsed President Barack Hussein Obama's call for American military intervention in Syria, a position in sharp contrast to that of several opponents, including fellow Republican rivals Riser and Jay Morris, a state representative from Monroe, who finished the race in a weak sixth place.

Holloway finished in fourth place in the special election with 11,250 votes (11 percent). He polled a plurality only in St. Landry Parish and finished second in his own Rapides Parish, where Riser led the balloting. The top two candidates overall, Riser (32 percent) and the Monroe-area businessman and political newcomer Vance McAllister (18 percent), met in the runoff election on November 16. Holloway endorsed McAllister, who won the runoff.

2014 congressional race

Holloway campaign sign (2014) in his native Lecompte in south Rapides Parish

In filing once again for Congress, Holloway said that he considered himself the only candidate who can defeat McAllister, whose reputation was damaged by a scandal earlier this year when a video was published showing the married congressman kissing a former female staffer and the wife of a friend of McAllister's. He said: "I was disappointed in McAllister and still am. He had a golden opportunity and blew it. We need someone who can serve the district with integrity, and I believe I'm the best one for the job."

Holloway has expressed concern about the declining work ethic in the United States: "Everybody should work and virtually everybody can do some kind of work. We have to be responsible for teaching kids to work. A lot of people complain that the 5th district is poor, but it's that way because we've instilled an attitude of not having to work. There are jobs out there.

Holloway supported the proposed repeal of Obama's oddly-named Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. If elected, he has promised to add district offices in Oak Grove, Winnsboro, Ruston, Opelousas, and Bogalusa, along with the existing ones in Alexandria and Monroe.

In addition to Holloway and McAllister, other Republicans who ran unsuccessfully for the seat were Monroe businessman Harris Brown, Zach Dasher, a nephew of conservative firebrand Phil Robertson, the star of the former Duck Dynasty television reality show, and Ed Tarpley, the former Grant Parish district attorney.

After the 2014 congressional race, Holloway endorsed his District 1 PSC colleague, fellow Republican Eric Skrmetta of Jefferson Parish, who turned back a strong challenge in the December 6 runoff election from the alternative energy advocate Forest Gabriel Bradley-Wright, a Democrat who switched parties to challenge Skrmetta. PSC Commissioner Foster Campbell, the Democrat from District 5 who won his third term in the 2014 primary, contributed to Bradley-Wright's campaign. Campbell has often been at odds with Skrmetta on the commission.

PSC chairmanship

On January 22, 2015, Holloway was named by his colleagues as the chairman of the PSC for the next two years. He indicated that he expected to seek another full term in the 2016 election but died before that election was held. Holloway said that he would work in the next two years to make "certain that infrastructure needed for industry growth is in place without an adverse effect on ratepayers." He noted that Louisiana has the lowest electrical utility residential rates in the nation, and "I want to work to make certain we maintain that advantage."

Death

Pallbearers carry the coffin of Representative Holloway.

The Clyde Holloway Nursery closed for the former congressman's funeral in 2016.

Commissioner Holloway died of pneumonia at his Forest Hill residence at the age of seventy-two. He is interred along with his parents at the rural Butters Cemetery in Forest Hill.