A 90-year-old... (Associated Press) 
 
 Now 90 and the oldest-ever member of the U.S. House, Hall is facing a potential political shootout of his own — against a Republican primary challenger barely half his age, backed by national conservative groups and well-schooled in digital- and data-heavy modern campaigning. Most Friday afternoons, Hall, who flew Hellcat fighters during World War II, hops a plane from Washington to Texas, then heads straight to the weekly gathering of U.S. military veterans. Hall's district is safely Republican but he captured just 45 percent of the vote against five challengers in last month's primary, and has been forced into his first runoff since being elected to Congress in 1980. His opponent, 48-year-old former U.S. attorney John Ratcliffe, won 29 percent and has been endorsed by powerful tea-party-aligned organizations, including the Senate Conservatives Fund and the Club for Growth, who see Ratcliffe as the race's only true conservative. "I'm running against a guy who has an airport, highway and lake named after him," Ratcliffe said, referring to Rockwall's municipal airport, and a nearby expressway and man-made lake project. Rep. Ralph Hall, 91, of Texas, is in a tight race against Tea Party favorite John Ratcliffe for the Republican nomination in a Dallas-area district. Hall has relied on a more-traditional campaign, using direct mailings and walking the district, interacting with voters and handing out pennies fitted with bands bearing his name. In the late 1970s, more than four out of five members of Congress were veterans. An avid jogger, Hall went skydiving when facing a 2012 primary challenge and had planned to do so twice this year but canceled due to icy conditions. Instead, he made a playful television ad pointing to the wrinkles on his face and calling them scars of congressional fights with liberals. As an indication of how seriously Hall is taking Ratcliffe, the congressman recently loaned his campaign $100,000, the first such loan in at least a decade. Ratcliffe has said repeatedly he hasn't made age an issue, arguing instead that Hall has become too cozy with the GOP establishment after 34 years in office. "I think it's fair to consider that," Ratcliffe said.
– Ralph Hall, already the oldest person ever to serve in the House of Representatives, is seeking a final term but the 91-year-old faces a tough challenge today from a 48-year-old opponent. John Ratcliffe is backed by conservative groups with strong Tea Party ties in the Republican primary runoff and he says he is the stronger conservative, the AP reports. But Hall, who first won his Dallas-area seat in 1980 and switched from Democrat to Republican in 2004, says the younger man is "running against my birth certificate." The contest will be a test of whether Hall's old-school, face-to-face campaigning style can hold up against his opponent's modern, digital, and data-heavy techniques, the AP noted last month. Hall—who once sold cigarettes and Coca-Cola to Bonnie and Clyde when he worked in a pharmacy as a boy—served in the Navy from 1942 to 1945 and if he does prevail, he will be the last World War II veteran in Congress, reports the New York Daily News. There are no veterans of the war still serving in the Senate and the only other World War II vet in the House is Michigan Democrat John Dingell, who is not seeking re-election.