WELDON - Pete Di Lauro, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, wheels a cart through the produce section of his local Wal-Mart on a recent spring day, four kids in tow, considering the high price of produce.

A bell pepper used to be 39 cents, he says. "Now it's $1.39."

He wonders: When was the last time U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole was in a Wal-Mart?

When Republican voters step into the polling booth in North Carolina's primary May 6, they will know practically nothing about this man, a native of New York City now living in tiny Weldon. Di Lauro won't appear in any political ads on voters' TVs this spring. He won't host $1,000-a-plate fundraisers or shake hands at Rotary club lunches.

He has neither the money nor the know-how for any of that.

Yet in an era of criminal lobbying scandals and high-priced political consultants, perhaps candidacies such as Di Lauro's feel a little closer to the ideals of the Constitution.

Every election season, hundreds of people become candidates across the country with budgets of nothing, believing their civics teachers were right -- anyone really can grow up to serve in public office.

Di Lauro joined fringe candidates in North Carolina running for governor, for Congress, for judgeships, for local town races. They are the ones who raise scarcely any money, campaign little, are often written off by the major media and party power players.

Some are searching for attention to a particular issue. Some are just searching for attention.

Di Lauro firmly believes that Washington politicians are sending the country in the wrong direction and that he, an unemployed former cop with a penchant for discount shopping, can make a difference.

He says that the war in Iraq has killed 4,000 U.S. troops needlessly, that more should be done to fight illegal immigration, that lawyers control America and that he, a struggling husband and father trying to make ends meet, understands the hardships of average North Carolina residents.

"You got the same people doing the same thing," Di Lauro said recently, describing his problem with Congress. "Who's responsible for all the woes of the government?"

Some political scientists call these wannabes on the edge "no-hope-er" candidates, because they have no hope of winning.

But they do have hope.

It's the hope that drives them.

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It's a warm spring day, and Di Lauro, 60, pokes through piles of paper cluttering his den before producing a clutch of envelopes he says have poured into his mailbox since he filed for office. They have various return addresses: a Lillington community club, a Cary business group, a local radio station.

More invitations are piled in the kitchen and the dining room. Di Lauro says he can't possibly make it to all these events just weeks before the primary.

How, he wonders, can you drive two hours here, then three hours there, then four hours there?

This isn't Di Lauro's first crack at public office. He ran for governor and county sheriff in New Jersey in the 1990s. He ran for town commissioner of Weldon last fall. He got eight votes.

Now Di Lauro has his attention on the U.S. Senate race. He's got nothing personal against Dole, he says. It's just that she's been working in Washington for 40 years. It's time for her to go.

A torn black T-shirt stretches across the generous torso of his 6-foot-4-inch frame. The shirt, size 2X, is torn at the sleeves and notched at the neck. What really makes the shirt stand out is the message stamped across it: "If They're In -- Vote Them Out -- Give Someone Else A Chance. PeteDiLauro.com."

He has a thousand of these shirts stashed in his garage. He wears one every day.

His wife, Janet, who works nights at a local nursing home, encouraged this candidacy. "It's an education for the children," she said. "We need to show the kids, because if we can't do it, maybe they can."

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Johnnie McLean, chief deputy director of the State Board of Elections, sees outsider candidates every year.

"They feel for whatever reason that this is something they have to do," she said. "For a brief period of time, these candidates believe they can be elected and that they can make a difference."

The U.S. Constitution says that to run for Senate, one must be 30 years old, a citizen of the United States and a resident of the state he or she hopes to represent.

As such, Di Lauro is qualified. He had only to write a check for $1,652 -- 1 percent of a U.S. senator's salary -- to get on North Carolina's ballot.

State Elections Director Gary Bartlett is moved, sometimes, by candidates who apparently had to scrape together the money for the filing fee.

Once, a few years ago, a guy came in who didn't have a checking account, just hundreds of dollars in cash.

"They're willing to sacrifice because it's important to them," Bartlett said. "They have a firm belief in it. You know, that's their right."

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But there's also the question of what drives such candidates.

Howard Staley tossed his name into the race against Dole -- albeit on the Democratic side -- because he didn't see anyone else jumping into the game. Then, when better-known people announced their candidacies, Staley decided to stick around.

A podiatrist from Chatham County, Staley doesn't like politics much. He ran for the U.S. Senate, he said, because he wasn't that interested in state or local issues. It was on the national level that he found his issues, the war and health-care reform among them.

And he doesn't consider himself a fringe candidate.

"Dark horse is the name I like," Staley said.

But he and others are on the fringes, in part because they can't raise money to get on the inside. Neither Staley nor Di Lauro expects to raise money.

Di Lauro predicts Dole will spend $5 million on her re-election campaign.

He's wrong: She has already raised at least $7 million.

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Dole's campaign won't discuss her Republican opponent. The Halifax County Republican party chairman has never heard of Di Lauro. The state Republican Party chairwoman has never heard of him.

McLean wonders about candidates who do nothing more than get their names on the ballot, those who won't campaign or expend any effort to get their message to voters. Are they taking advantage of the process, running just to see their names in print?

"I think anyone running for office should know what is expected for that particular office, and they should be prepared to deal with that should they be elected," she said.

Duke University's Mike Munger thinks more people like Di Lauro ought to get the chance to run for office.

Munger is himself trying to get on the November ballot as the Libertarian candidate for governor.

"Who cares how many names there are [on the ballot]?" asked Munger, chairman of Duke's political science department.

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Di Lauro may think he has an advantage in ballot position alphabetically, but he also knows polls have him hovering at 10 percent against Dole.

Political scientists say those numbers aren't about him; they're protest votes against Dole.

"Nobody takes independents seriously," Di Lauro says, back at his house as his kids play outside. "Nobody'll give you credit for anything. You're a joker. You're a schmo."

So why run?

"Why? Because it needs it," he says. "Because it's a job, because it has to be done."