Nice scoop by the Des Moines Register’s Jason Noble yesterday: Mark Jacobs, the former president and CEO of Reliant Energy in Texas, may seek the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Iowa. Jacobs moved to West Des Moines last year and recently founded an education reform advocacy group called Reaching Higher Iowa.

I’ve posted Jacobs’ short bio after the jump, along with initial thoughts on his strengths and weaknesses as a candidate.

CORRECTION: The Register’s Jennifer Jacobs was the first to report yesterday that Mark Jacobs might be a Senate candidate. In addition to other potential candidates Bleeding Heartland has discussed before (Matt Whitaker, Matt Schultz, A.J. Spiker, Joni Ernst, Rod Roberts, Bob Vander Plaats, and David Young), her piece also mentioned West Des Moines Mayor Steve Gaer, orthopedic surgeon Stuart Weinstein, McDonald’s franchise owner Kevin O’Brien, and business owner Ron Langston, who served “as national director of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Minority Business Development Agency under President George W. Bush.”

SECOND CORRECTION: I missed that The Iowa Republican speculated about Jacobs as a Senate candidate a couple of weeks ago.  

The Reaching Higher Iowa website includes this bio.

Mark Jacobs came home to Iowa to give back to the state that gave him his start. Mark founded Reaching Higher Iowa to improve public education in Iowa and ultimately make it #1 in the country, just like it was when he was growing up here. He also teaches a capstone business strategy class to graduating seniors at Iowa State University. Additionally, Mark is seeking investment opportunities with companies that have a mission of improving people’s lives, and where he can work with founders and CEOs in growing their businesses.

Prior to moving home, Mark was President and CEO of Reliant Energy. Originally joining Reliant as CFO in 2002 when it was near bankruptcy and under state and federal investigations, Mark was part of a team that managed a turnaround that saved the company. In 2007, at the age of 45, he was named CEO, one of the youngest at the helm of a Fortune 500 company. Mark successfully navigated Reliant through an unprecedented series of extreme challenges, including the financial meltdown of 2008 and the devastation caused when Hurricane Ike ripped through the heart of the company’s service territory. Earlier in his career, Mark spent 13 years in New York advising companies and business owners on high-level strategic and financial matters.

In addition to his leadership role in business, Mark continues his long track record of leadership in civic and social issues, especially public education. His fervent belief that every child deserves a quality education led him to KIPP Houston Public Schools, a high-performing charter school network serving over 9,500 economically disadvantaged students and one of the great success stories in education reform. He served KIPP as a board member for six years, most recently as board chair.

Mark graduated from Roosevelt High School in Des Moines in 1980. He holds a B.B.A., cum laude, from Southern Methodist University (1984) and a Master of Management, with distinction, from Northwestern University (1989). Mark and his wife, Janet, have three children: Clark, Christy, and Sam. The family resides in West Des Moines.

I’ve been thinking someone from the Iowa business community might take a shot at the GOP Senate nomination. Republicans like successful corporate executives, so Jacobs’ background could be an asset in a primary.

He’s not well known to conservative activists, but presumably he would be able to self-fund a campaign, with plenty of statewide direct mail and paid advertising to introduce himself. UPDATE: Via Kevin Hall, Jacobs earned nearly $10 million in total compensation during the 2012 fiscal year alone.

Some signs point to Governor Terry Branstad’s associates pushing State Senator Joni Ernst to run for U.S. Senate. On the other hand, Jacobs seems to have built up goodwill with the governor. Noble reported for the Des Moines Register that Reaching Higher Iowa “has lobbied on behalf of Branstad’s education reform package and Jacobs has traveled around the state speaking with service organizations and other audiences about the need for reform.” Yesterday Branstad spoke at an education reform forum Jacobs’ group organized in Des Moines. Jacobs told the audience “that his greatest desire was to change Iowa’s licensure procedures to allow professionals from different backgrounds to become teachers, and challenged attendees to commit to a similar goal for improving education.”

Most Iowa Republicans would probably support changes to teacher licensure procedures. On the downside, not everyone in the GOP base has welcomed the governor’s education reform package. Features like the “common core” and statewide standards are dirty words for some social conservatives and homeschoolers.

I was not able to find any record of past political donations by Jacobs. Given his background as a senior executive at a Houston-based firm, I wonder whether he has ever written checks to Democratic politicians in Texas, serving at either the state or federal level. If so, that could become a big problem in an Iowa Republican primary.

Reliant Energy’s spotty environmental record might become an issue in a general election campaign if Jacobs became the Senate nominee. However, running a company that’s a major air polluter wouldn’t be a drawback in a GOP primary.

Any relevant comments are welcome in this thread.