Hamilton Jordan Plans Senate Bid

Hamilton Jordan, who served as chief of staff in the Jimmy Carter White House, told The Times Sunday night that he plans to run for the Senate from Georgia next year.

“I fully expect to announce the first part of next year when I finish my treatment for cancer, which I think will show I’m completely free of it,” Jordan said. “I spent the last few years trying to make money and haven’t been very happy because I’ve gotten away from what I do best--politics.”

Jordan, 41, who has been living in the Washington area while undergoing treatment for lymphoma at the National Institutes of Health, told friends that only the failure to get a “clean bill of health” from his doctors would prevent him from making the race against freshman Sen. Mack Mattingly (R-Ga.).

Sources said that a CAT-scan had found Jordan free of cancer but that he will undergo another scan within the next month to determine whether he has completely recovered from the lymphoma.

Friends said he made his decision to run after he failed to persuade at least two other Georgians--Rep. Ed Jenkins and Georgia football coach Vince Dooley--to make the race. Jordan, the friends said, told them that he was making a high-figure income as a political consultant but finally decided that “it’s not the way I want to spend the rest of my life.”