Though he took a trombone to D.C. for practice, he's been too busy watching congressmen play politics to play any tunes. Haliburton works as one of 63 pages in the U.S. House of Representatives, one of only 10 pages nominated by Democrats and one of only five who are black. When you run for an office, you're there to do a job for your community and your country. Haliburton is the son of William F. and Natividad Haliburton of Waco. He is the first page Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, in office since 1991, has ever sponsored.
Legislators get that opportunity on a seniority basis.
Pages run messages and packages between offices, take flags to be flown over the Capitol for people who request them, work at the desk in the back of the House floor or work in the cloakrooms adjacent to it where members await votes and take breaks during the session. Until the first session of the 105th Congress ended Nov. 13, Haliburton was a Democratic Cloakroom page, responsible for getting messages to representatives on the floor and keeping them posted on goings on. Sometimes it was like a drag when there's nothing but talking, but then you have those exciting nights when they're trying to get things passed. He said the latest he has stayed at work was about 2 a.m. one night near the end of the session. Haliburton starts his days early with Spanish, computer science, math, English and U.S. history classes.