2026 Power & Influence: 50-41 – Alabama’s top political players

—

April 1, 2026

After November, Alabama will have a new governor, the newest slate of constitutional officers in a generation, and a brand new state house.

The one thing it will not have is a shortage of people who are absolutely certain they should be in charge of all three.

But those who actually are – can be found on this year’s list.

As Yellowhammer News celebrates its 15th anniversary, in a special edition of this year’s Power & Influence: Top 50, we’re taking stock of the most effective figures in the modern era of Alabama politics – and making picks of who will dominate in the next.

The honorees featured in this year’s edition are some of the most proven power players of the past decade-plus. And those who have been paying attention to our rankings for that long know that we’re not just guessing.

Informed by those who know best, including Montgomery itself, each year we recognize the top individuals in government, politics, and business who leverage their power and influence to set the agenda, move the ball – and when necessary, stop things cold.

Here’s our look behind the curtain of who’s running state government right now more than ever:

50. Will Fuller

Capitol Resources

Will Fuller is always cooking. In Montgomery, that has become one of the safer bets on the board. The guy is always on. And it serves him and his clients well.

Back in 2019, when we put him on our Who’s Next list, we wrote that he could become one of the best lobbyists in Alabama before long. That was not wrong. It was just early.

Fuller brought his early legal and political instincts to Toby Roth and John Hagood’s shop at a time when their bar was already high – and he’s on his way to being a top gun himself.

In his first visit to the Top 50 list, he’s no longer one to watch. He’s one you’re dealing with.

49. Wes Allen

Alabama Secretary of State

Wes Allen’s influence runs much deeper than the Secretary of State’s office. Relationships with lawmakers, probate judges, and the county officials who run elections are the most tightly connected political networks in the state – and Allen talks to them every day.

He returns calls. He shows up. He knows the job at every level because he has held it at nearly every level – Pike County probate judge, House member, and now Alabama’s chief elections official.

He’s secured endorsements from a majority of the Alabama House Republican caucus in his bid for 2026 bid not because of name ID, but because the members who have watched him work.

Allen didn’t talk his way onto this list. He worked his way on.

48. Chris Elliott

Alabama State Senate

A real bulldog. And not the decorative kind.

Elliott is aggressive at the mic, a relentless negotiator with a sharp sense of leverage behind the scenes, and constitutionally incapable of letting go of a fight once he’s decided he is right.

That hangtime between bite and knowing when to let go, like bulldogs, gets Elliott in trouble the most. It is also what makes him effective.

He has a habit of forcing himself into any given policy debate in Montgomery. More often than not, he leaves fingerprints on the final product.

A principled conservative who might call his district “God’s country” more than any other lawmaker in the state does theirs, Elliott’s unflinching

Now in his second term, and with a clear path to a third, he is accruing the kind of influence we respect most: hard-fought and hard-earned.

47. CJ Hincy

Auburn University

A veteran of the Statehouse with deep, hard-earned relationships, few embody the daily grind more than C.J. Hincy. Whether arriving early or staying late, he is a constant presence — observing, engaging, and anticipating.

But what sets Hincy apart isn’t just his work ethic.

His genuinely warm personality and natural ability to build lasting relationships have made him one of the most well-liked figures in Montgomery, the kind of person lawmakers are glad to see walking through the door.

Pair that with a deep command of higher education policy, and you have someone who can work a room and win an argument in the same afternoon. In an environment where progress is measured incrementally, Hincy is always looking for the next opportunity to move Auburn’s priorities forward — and he usually knows where to find it.

46. Mary Pat Lawrence

Protective Life

There is a short list of people in Alabama politics whose presence alone signals that a conversation just got more serious. It’s a shorter list than most people think. Mary Pat Lawrence is on it.

Her background is the kind Montgomery respects — no explanation needed.

She grew up in Anniston, earned her undergraduate and law degrees at the University of Alabama, and got her first taste of Washington by interning for Richard Shelby on Capitol Hill.

What followed was two decades at the center of federal power — the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, Jeff Sessions’ office, two of Washington’s most influential lobbying firms, and one of the country’s largest insurers.

Along the way, she built something few others in her position could have — the Alabama Business Coalition — which brings together a savvy partnership of the state’s major employers and its federal legislative delegation.

Protective Life brought her back to Birmingham in 2018. Alabama’s gain.

45. Steve Livingston

Alabama Senate Majority Leader

Steve Livingston is the kind of Senate leader who makes the hard parts look routine.

When Livingston fell short in a tight two-way race for the Pro Tem spot halfway through the term, lesser men would have checked out. But Livingston went to work. That’s why he remains the most durable balance of power in the chamber.

He brokers compromise from within the caucus, moves conservative legislation, and keeps the supermajority rowing in the same direction without every disagreement turning into a fracture.

That’s a different kind of power. With an almost entirely new executive branch coming online in 2027, it may be the kind that lasts longest.

44. Ben Patterson

Fine Geddie & Associates

There are lobbyists who know the issue. There are lobbyists who know the room. Ben Patterson has spent two decades making those two things look like one.

He came to Fine Geddie in 2004 carrying more Alabama institutional mileage than most people accumulate in a career — deputy finance director under two governors, state Chief Information Officer, top advocate for the banking industry, former BCA hand, and an actual Ph.D. in the subject. He then spent the next twenty years becoming the most trusted read on the Alabama Senate that serious people can find.

By the time most people think they need a read on the upper chamber, Patterson is usually already working from the next page.

Fine Geddie has been called the most powerful contract lobbying firm in Montgomery for fifty years. Patterson has spent twenty of them making sure that stays true.

43. Anthony Daniels

Alabama House Minority Leader

In nine years as House Minority Leader, Daniels has never once had the votes to win a chamber fight by himself. But he’s found other ways to win anyway. A lot of them, in fact.

In each session he’s been in that role, he has personally passed major legislation in a chamber where his caucus holds fewer than one-in-three seats, against a supermajority that hasn’t lost a meaningful statewide race since 2010. Sounds impossible. But not for him.

Daniels pulls that off through sincere personal relationships, strategic patience, and an uncanny ability to know which fights are worth having and exactly when to have them.

He’s been here since 2014. He knows every hallway, has every contact in his phone, and has learned every trick in the book.

The incoming administration will need to get to know him better than they might think.

42. Preston Cauthen

Alabama Power

When we named Preston Cauthen to our Who’s Next list back in 2017, we credited him with a friendly demeanor and a promising start. Nearly a decade later, he has considerably added to that inventory.

Cauthen has spent his tenure at Alabama Power’s Montgomery operation building something most lobbyists spend entire careers chasing and never catch — a reputation so airtight that lawmakers seek him out before he ever has to seek them.

He makes strong, quiet relationships with the state’s most influential figures, and that quietly accumulated trust has translated into real power, both in Montgomery and beyond.

There’s no flash to how he operates. There doesn’t need to be.

41. Brandon Farmer

Alabama Nursing Home Association

Brandon Farmer runs one of those associations that may not dominate the reception chatter in Montgomery, but can still make the State House tune in when the stakes are real. In Alabama politics, the nursing home world is not a small stakes cottage.

Farmer came into the Alabama Nursing Home Association with a healthcare and government-relations background that made him a natural fit for one of the state’s most sensitive and operationally complex trades.

When his association gets behind a candidate, you’d better know they will be well funded.

Proof of that played out strongly in this year’s session through the legislation that had his attention.