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| Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN) |
Because Smith, who (thanks in large part to a cascade of both Democrats and Republicans who turned down a chance to run for her seat) appears to be the likely favorite to win the remainder of Sen. Franken's term this November, is unusual in her political history. A longtime political operative in the DFL, Smith has only ever been elected to one other political office, that of lieutenant governor, an office that historically has had little power (outside of Texas), and isn't a great stepping stone to higher office. Frequently it's the kiss-of-death when it comes to gubernatorial campaigns if you run directly from being LG to Gov (in the same way that Martin van Buren & George HW Bush are the only sitting vice presidents to succeed the man they ran with) but I thought it would be interesting to take a look at the top ten most common political or, particularly, elected offices that current members of the United States Senate held prior to serving in the Senate.
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| Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI), during her term as Lieutenant Governor |
Lieutenant governors are on this list thanks to Hawaii. While five senators have served as LG's prior to being in the Senate (Smith included), two of those senators (Mazie Hirono and Brian Schatz) both used the spot as a springboard to the Senate. And in the case of Hirono, she had to take a detour to the US House after a failed gubernatorial bid before she eventually became a senator, running for the retiring Daniel Akaka.
It's worth noting that two of these LG's (Jim Risch and Tim Kaine) served as governor as well, that being their more important resume-line when they ran for the Senate, and Hirono arguably being more palatable as a Senate candidate because of her time in the House. Smith is the only current member of the Senate whose only elected position was as Lieutenant Governor, but unlike Brian Schatz (who was appointed from LG to the Senate), she won't have to endure a tough primary right out of the gate.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: None, really. Smith's already a senator, and no other lieutenant governor appears to be a likely candidate for the Senate.
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| Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), when she was CA Attorney General |
Attorney General is the most glamorous statewide constitutional office, and almost always seems like a stepping stone to higher office (or at least is the first person you look to to run for the governor's mansion or the Senate). This is true for most of the eight former AG's who have won the Senate seat, as all but two of the Democrats who have served as AG held no office between their time in the Justice Departments for their states and the Senate. The two exceptions were Dan Sullivan of Alaska, who served briefly as the Last Frontier's AG and then became the director of the state's Natural Resources Department under Sean Parnell, and Tom Udall, who parlayed his career as the state's top law enforcement officer into a decade in the House before becoming a senator.
What surprised me amongst the eight people who had held this seat is that only half of them (John Cornyn, Kamala Harris, Richard Blumenthal, & Sheldon Whitehouse) went directly from the AG's office to the Senate. In addition to Udall and Sullivan, you also have Catherine Cortez Masto, who took a two-year break from politics before running for her mentor Harry Reid's seat, and Heidi Heitkamp, who took a dozen year's between her failed run for governor in 2000 and running for Kent Conrad's seat in 2012.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Two Attorneys General are running as Republican challengers in Trump states: Josh Hawley (Missouri) and Patrick Morrissey (West Virginia)
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| Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), duirng her time as mayor |
Perhaps the most fascinating part of this project was realizing that there are more mayors in the Senate than I anticipated. This is because most of the mayors that do run for the Senate or Governor do so rather unimpressively, and indeed among these eight mayors only two of them (Bob Corker & Dianne Feinstein) didn't hold another office between their time in the mayor's office and being a senator (and in Feinstein's case, she had pursued being governor in 1990 & lost before she became the Golden State's long-serving senator).
While very populous areas like Richmond (Tim Kaine), San Francisco (Feinstein), Newark (Cory Booker), and Tulsa (Jim Inhofe) all had senator-mayors, it's fun to note that some relatively small cities have been the jumping-off points of the careers of future senators. Bob Menendez, for example, was mayor of Urban City, not even in the ten largest cities in his state, while Mike Enzi served as Mayor of Gillette, Wyoming, before he became a major fixture in the Wyoming State Legislature. And of course it's worth remembering that former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, before he became a longtime member of Congress, was the mayor of Burlington, VT.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Amongst major candidates, we have former Nashville Mayor Phil Bredesen, Lou Barletta, who served as mayor of the small Pennsylvania town of Hazleton, and Jim Renacci, who was mayor of Wadsworth, Ohio before going to Congress.
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| Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), as Jackson County Prosecutor |
While only three current senators went straight from being a county executive to serving in the world's most exclusive club, nine of them got their starts in county government. Oftentimes organizations like Emily's List will try to recruit women to run for positions in county government in large part because they know that these officials end up moving onto higher office and state legislatures, and indeed the United States Senate.
Most of the people who have served in county government have been out of it so long you don't really think of them as having that on their resume, including Claire McCaskill (Jackson County prosecutor for 5 years), Tim Scott (an 8-year veteran of the Charleston County Council), and Jim Risch (Ada County Prosecuting Attorney). Three senators have gone straight from a county job to the US Senate: Amy Klobuchar (Hennepin County Attorney), Mitch McConnell (Jefferson County Executive), and Chris Coons (New Castle County Executive).
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: It's a surprisingly sparse list, as the only candidates I can really find with county-level experience are Jenny Wilson (Salt Lake County Councilor) and Leah Vukmir (a Milwaukee County Executive).
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| Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), when he first took public office |
In an era where we cry "throw the bums out" on a regular basis and claim all of Washington is corrupt, it's no surprise that a number of senators have had no previous elected experience, nor have they held a major federal office like cabinet secretary. People like Orrin Hatch, for example, went straight from being a very successful attorney to winning something of an upset victory over Sen. Frank Moss (ironically, Hatch, the longest-serving Republican in the Senate, won on a platform of term limits on his first run for office, proving truly no one ever cares about term limit promises).
A lack of elected experience hardly means a disinterest in government affairs, however. While people like Hatch or David Perdue seemed to seemingly decide one day "I'm going to be a senator," others had toiled in DC or their state capitols for years prior to making the jump to elected office. Mike Lee and Ted Cruz had both served in gubernatorial administrations, and Elizabeth Warren & Michael Bennet had both served in past presidential administrations. Susan Collins had run for governor just two years prior, and Rand Paul was the son of a congressman. The story of the person who just randomly decides to run for office usually starts a bit lower on the totem pole, rather than shooting straight to be Mr. Smith going to Washington.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Weirdly, none. The NRSC largely got elected officials (even if they weren't all the ones they initially hoped for), and the DSCC mostly got incumbents, so it appears likely every freshman senator starting next January will have some government experience.
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| Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA), when he was in the Richmond City Government |
It feels weird to think of city governments being the byproduct of future senators, since our city officials are our neighbors and friends who know us by name, but that's oftentimes where things begin for US Senators, including ten that are currently in office. Unlike the county boards, however, not a single one of the current US Senators went directly from being a city official to the US Senate.
That doesn't mean that they didn't have impressive careers in city government, of course. Tim Kaine & Cory Booker parlayed their city council posts as a stepping stone to becoming mayor, and the likes of people like Gary Peters or Martin Heinrich transformed their city posts into runs for the state legislature, and then Congress. Perhaps the most famous city official currently in the Senate would be Dianne Feinstein, who after years on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors ended up becoming mayor upon the death of George Moscone (who died in the same assassination that killed gay rights activist Harvey Milk).
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Again, a shockingly light list considering that this is a pretty basic building block to higher office, but Jim Renacci (Wadsworth City Council President) and Beto O'Rourke (El Paso City Council) both had runs in city government before going to Congress.
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| Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), when she was governor |
I could do a whole other article about the art of governors running for the Senate, and indeed, it is a much-discussed topic. Nearly always sought after as potential Senate candidates since they know how to win a statewide race, governors also have historically hated being in the exhausting, deliberative body & also have not always been ideal candidates, frequently not being able to transition from running as a state candidate (where partisanship is less important) and a federal candidate (where it's essential).
Still, though, eleven current senators have also served as governors, ranging from those directly elected from governor to the Senate (John Hoeven & Maggie Hassan) to those who took a bit of a detour (Angus King waited a decade between being governor and running for the Senate, & Jeanne Shaheen, Mike Rounds, & Lamar Alexander also had big breaks in their terms of service). Jim Risch, whom I am finding may have the most fascinating resume in the US Senate in terms of prior experience, actually only served briefly as governor before becoming lieutenant governor again, and then went to the Senate.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: We have three former governors that are running (or seem likely to run) this year. They include sitting Florida Gov. Rick Scott (who hasn't officially announced yet but is widely assumed to be a candidate), former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, and Mitt Romney, who could become only the second person ever to represent a different state as governor and as a senator (the first being Sam Houston).
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| Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), when she was in the State Senate |
Now we're moving away from the small cliques of previous experience to genuinely statistically-significant numbers. The State Senate (or the upper house of each state-some have weird names), has been the home of 24 current future senators. Frequently it's commented upon how the Democrats saw their bench wiped out during the Obama years, and that's evident here because state legislators are going to be the people that eventually run for Congress.
While many of the state senators who eventually became senators had a step in-between (such as congressman or governor), that isn't the case for all of them. Jon Tester, for example, was the Montana State Senate President before he won a bit of an upset victory in 2006 to become a US Senator, while the likes of Patty Murray, John Barrasso, & Joni Ernst all made it straight from the State Senate in their states to the hallowed halls of the Senate Chamber. Many eventual senators took leadership roles during their time in the State Senate, including Mike Crapo, Mike Rounds, and, yes, Jim Risch once again.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Here the list gets quite a bit longer, with seven serious candidates being state senators at some point in their careers: Kelli Ward (AZ), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Kevin de Leon (CA), Matt Rosendale (MT), Marsha Blackburn (TN), Evan Jenkins (WV), and Leah Vukmir (WI) all having served in their state's senate. De Leon, Ward, & Vukmir are running with the State Senate being their most recent elected experience.
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| Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), during his time in the State House |
I suspect mostly because there are more people who have served in them, period, but State House members do outnumber State Senators when it comes to the current lineup in the United States Senate. Thirty (nearly a third) of all US Senators got their starts in their state legislatures.
Five of these thirty went straight from being a member of their State House to the US Senate, all but one of them having had a position of leadership in the body prior to joining the Senate. They include Alaska House Majority Leader Lisa Murkowski, Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley, Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, and North Carolina House Speaker Thom Tillis. The only person who was elected straight from being a state legislator to the Senate was Deb Fischer, who won an unusual primary in 2012 that she likely wouldn't have emerged victorious in had it been a one-on-one race (she only got 40% of the vote). All-in-all, this is a very common resume-item, but unless you're leading your State House, it's probably unwise to try and run straight for the Senate.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Again we have seven, though not entirely the same seven: Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Kevin de Leon (CA), Luke Messer (IN), Mike Braun (IN), Matt Rosendale (MT), Evan Jenkins (WV), and Leah Vukmir (WI). Braun is the only candidate whose most recent elected experience is the State House.
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| Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), then in the US House |
If every senator looks in the mirror and sees a president, as the saying goes, then every member of the House looks in the mirror and sees a senator, and with good reason: members of the House tend to get promoted to the US Senate with immense frequency (it happens literally every two years), as is evidenced by exactly half of all US Senators having served in both chambers.
Typically members of the House don't serve there for a long-time until they serve in the Senate. While there are exceptions to this rule (Ben Cardin, Bernie Sanders, & Ed Markey all served very long careers in the House before becoming senators), most only last 4-6 terms before they seek a promotion. Some members of the Senate, in fact, only served one-term in the House before they moved up (Maria Cantwell & Tom Cotton come to mind).
There are a lot of systematic reasons for a congressmen being attractive Senate candidates. For starters, they know the issues of the day and know how to handle the rigorous DC press corps already. Secondly, they are clearly someone who has enough ambition to run for federal office & has followed through with victory, and that kind of drive/determination isn't easy to find in a politician. And perhaps most importantly, unlike governors or state legislators (or ordinary people), they can stockpile money in their House seats for years and transfer that over to a Senate run thanks to campaign finance laws. That's a big help in an era where a competitive Senate race can cost tens of millions of dollars.
2018 Challengers to Join the List?: Clearly, House members got the 50% memo as we have a lot of them running in 2018. They include: Martha McSally & Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Luke Messer & Todd Rokita (IN), Jacky Rosen (NV), Kevin Cramer (ND), Jim Renacci (OH), Lou Barletta (PA), Marsha Blackburn & Stephen Fincher (TN), Beto O'Rourke (TX), and Evan Jenkins (WV). All but Fincher is a currently-serving member of Congress.
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