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Tom Graves said he isn’t running for Congress to change the country’s direction.

“I’m running to help restore America’s direction,” Graves told the Calhoun Optimist Club Wednesday.

Graves, R-Ranger, is in his fourth term representing State House District 12. He announced in May that he would run for the Republican nomination for the 9th Congressional District seat currently by Nathan Deal, who is running for governor.

“I am optimistic about the future,” Graves told the Optimists. “I believe in the American people.”

Graves said in the past several months he has spoken to groups across the state. “I have found that the people are fired up and they are willing to work hard to elect the right people,” he said.

He said major initiatives now being pushed in Congress will hurt Americans.

“The Cap and Trade bill should be called the ‘India and China Economic Development Act’ because the burden it will put on American business will force them to go overseas,” he said.

He said he is also concerned that the health care bill will put a large burden on small businesses.

“The federal government is trying to spend itself into prosperity,” he said. “Now we are seeing the American people start to push back.”

Graves, a small business owner himself, sponsored the Jobs, Opportunity and Business Success Act during the 2009 General Assembly session.

The bill, which won overwhelming approval in the House and Senate, proposed a series of tax cuts and tax credits for Georgia business, all of which were designed to put people back to work, he said.

The provisions included elimination of the business inventory tax, tax credits for job creation and retention and cutting the state’s capital gains tax in half, however, the only provision that was signed into law was the elimination of the inventory tax.

Graves, who was first elected to the Georgia House of Representatives in 2002, has chaired numerous subcommittees, served in several leadership positions and been recognized statewide as a conservative leader.

He received the 2009 “Guardian of Small Business” Award from the National Federation of Independent Business, 2009 “Legislator of the Year” Award from the Georgia Retail Association, the “2009 Legislator of the Year” from the 9th Congressional District of Georgia and was nationally recognized as the “Legislative Entrepreneur of the Year Award” by the Freedom Works Foundation for his tireless effort to stem the tide of expansive government and reduce the tax burden on Georgians.

Graves grew up in Bartow County and graduated from the University of Georgia, where he earned a Bachelors of Business Administration in finance.

He is a past member of the Gordon County Board of Elections and an active member of the Gordon County Chamber of Commerce. He is married to Julie, a native of Marietta, and the couple has three children, JoAnn, J.T., and Janey. They attend Belmont Baptist Church in Calhoun.