Former U.S. Rep. Mike Espy brought a surprise to Vicksburg Thursday, introducing a nephew, state Rep. Chuck Espy, he said will try to unseat seven-term incumbent Rep. Bennie Thompson in 2006.

For his part, Mike Espy, a Yazoo City native who has a Jackson-based law practice, said he is no longer personally interested in public office.

He was chosen by voters in the mostly Delta district as the state’s first black federal official in 1986 and won re-election by increasing margins until being tapped as Secretary of Agriculture in 1992 by President Clinton.

Thompson, a Bolton native and member of the Hinds County Board of Supervisors, was chosen as Espy’s successor and has won re-election every two years since.

Espy told members of the Vicksburg Rotary Club that Chuck Espy, who has been a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives representing Quitman and Coahoma counties since 2000, will be a good candidate.

&#8220It is not important how long you have served. It is important how well you serve,” he said, adding that his nephew’s door will be open to anyone in Mississippi if he is elected to Congress. Both Espys and Thompson are Democrats.

Espy, who resigned from the Clinton cabinet in 1993 amid accusations of personal gain, said he learned a lot while having a special counsel spending $26 million trying to convict him of wrongdoing and having to spend $1.5 million to defend himself.

&#8220You find out what you can endure and what you can overcome,” he said.

Espy also said you find out who your real friends are.

In the end, however, he was able to hear what he called the three sweetest syllables in all the world, &#8220not guilty,” 39 times.

As an attorney, Espy has been retained by the Claiborne County Board of Supervisors to help leverage benefits for the county if a second nuclear generating unit is built at the Grand Gulf Nuclear Station in that county. The original reactor was built in 1970s and has been operational since.

In August, NuStart Energy, a consortium of power companies, listed Claiborne as one of two building sites.

&#8220They have received their early site permit,” he said, and added they will soon receive the early operating license, the next step in the approval process.

Espy also said he is chief counsel for Feed the Children, a charity that has grown to No. 3 in size behind the Salvation Army and the Red Cross with about $1.6 billion raised.

He said he is involved with a group that builds large agricultural projects and mills for processing food and other products all over the world and with a group that will be involved in advising Congress on the Farm Bill of 2007 which will be marked up in 2006.