When Gore gave up his Senate seat, the Democrat governor of Tennessee, Ned Ray McWherter, appointed Harlan Mathews to the seat. In November 1994 there was a special election to choose who would serve out the remaining two years, which Fred won (Mathews wasn’t a candidate), and he was sworn in a month later in Dec. 1994...then beat Jim Cooper in a regular election in 1996.
yup, I’d forgotten how vacant Senate seats were filled in TN. Although Fred has a little more election experience than I was remembering, still, I can see how it would be harder for him to campaign, for example, in states that are much more liberal than TN. (Which isn’t to say he didn’t get his share of leftist questions during his runs for Senate. Just a matter of degree.)