Roy Blunt

This article is about the United States representative. For the writer and humorist, see Roy Blount, Jr.

Roy Blunt
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Missouri's 7th District
Incumbent
Assumed office January 3, 1997
Preceded by	Mel Hancock
22nd Republican Whip of the United States House of Representatives
In office January 3, 2003 – January 3, 2009
Leader	John Boehner
Preceded by	Tom DeLay
Succeeded by	Eric Cantor
25th Majority Whip of the United States House of Representatives
In office January 3, 2003 – January 3, 2007
Leader	Tom DeLay Himself (acting) John Boehner
Preceded by	Tom DeLay
Succeeded by	Jim Clyburn
Majority Leader of the United States House of Representatives (Acting)
In office September 29, 2005 – February 2, 2006
Preceded by	Tom DeLay
Succeeded by	John Boehner
Personal details
Born	(1950-01-10) January 10, 1950 Niangua, Missouri
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Roseann Ray Blunt (div.) Abigail Perlman Blunt
Children	Matthew Roy Blunt Amy Blunt Mosby Andrew Blunt Alexander Charles Blunt (adopted)
Residence	Strafford, Missouri
Alma mater	Southwest Baptist University, Southwest Missouri State University
Profession	college administrator

Roy D. Blunt (born January 10, 1950) is an American politician from the U.S. state of Missouri. He represents Missouri's 7th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives, which takes in most of Southwest Missouri, the most conservative part of the state, anchored in the city of Springfield and also includes other conservative cities such as Joplin, Carthage, and Neosho. The district also contains the popular tourist destination of Branson. Blunt was the House Majority Whip during the 110th Congress but announced that he would step down from the position following the results of the 2008 general elections. Blunt is a member of the Republican Party.

After House Majority Leader Tom DeLay stepped down due to a criminal indictment in Texas, Blunt served as interim House Majority Leader from September 29, 2005, to February 2, 2006, when John Boehner of Ohio was elected as DeLay's permanent replacement.

Blunt is the father of Matt Blunt, the former Governor of Missouri from 2005-2009.

On February 19, 2009, Blunt announced he would seek the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Republican U.S. Senator Kit Bond in 2010.

Personal life

Blunt was born in Niangua, Missouri to Neva Dora Letterman and Leroy O. Blunt. He earned a bachelor of arts degree in history from Southwest Baptist University in 1970. Two years later, he earned a master's degree in history from Missouri State University (then Southwest Missouri State University).

Blunt has been married twice. He married Roseann Ray in May 1967 and had three children with her: Matt (the former Governor of Missouri), Amy Blunt Mosby, and Andrew Blunt. Amy and Andrew are lawyers and lobbyists. Blunt and Ray divorced after 35 years of marriage. Afterward, he married Abigail Perlman, a lobbyist for Kraft Foods, on October 18, 2003. In April 2006, he and his wife adopted an 18-month old boy from Russia, whom they renamed Alexander Charles "Charlie" Blunt. Blunt also has five grandchildren: Davis Mosby, Eva Mosby, Ben Blunt, William Branch Blunt, and Allyson Blunt.

Political career

1997, Congressional Pictorial Directory, Roy Blunt in his first term in the U.S. House of Representatives

Blunt entered politics in 1972, when he was elected county clerk and chief election official of Greene County (where Springfield is located). Blunt was the Republican nominee for Lieutenant Governor of Missouri in 1980 but lost to Democrat Ken Rothman. He served as Greene County Clerk until 1984, when he was elected to the office of Secretary of State of Missouri — the first Republican to hold the post in 50 years.

He ran unsuccessfully for Governor of Missouri in 1992, losing the Republican primary to Missouri Attorney General William L. Webster.

From 1993 to 1996, Blunt was President of Southwest Baptist University, his alma mater.

Blunt was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1996, when incumbent U.S. Representative Mel Hancock honored his pledge to serve only four terms. Blunt's district, the most conservative district in Missouri, is located in the Ozark Mountains in the southwestern part of the state and includes cities such as Springfield and Joplin.

Upon entering the U.S. House, Blunt served on the House International Relations Committee, the House Committee on Agriculture, and the House Transportation Committee. In 1999, he gave up seats on the latter two committees and joined the powerful House Committee on Energy and Commerce. He has also served on the Republican Conference Steering Committee since his election to the U.S. House of Representatives, a committee that determines to which committees Republican members of the House are assigned and elevates members to positions of ranking member or chair.

After only one term, Blunt was appointed as chief deputy whip, the highest appointed position in the House Republican Caucus. In that capacity, he served as the Republicans' chief vote-counter. When Dick Armey retired and fellow Texan Tom DeLay was elected to succeed him, Blunt was elected to succeed DeLay as House Majority Whip.

On January 8, 2006, one day after DeLay announced that he would not seek to regain his position, Blunt announced he would run to permanently replace DeLay. On January 14, 2006, he issued a release claiming that the majority of the Republican caucus had endorsed him as DeLay's successor. However, when the election was held by secret ballot on February 2, 2006, U.S. Representative John Boehner of Ohio won on the second ballot, with 122 votes to 109 for Blunt. In November 2006, Blunt was elected by House Republicans to their second-highest position during the 110th Congress, House Minority Whip. Blunt handily defeated U.S. Representative John Shadegg of Arizona for the position.

Since he was first elected in 1996, Blunt has been reelected six times without significant opposition. Blunt's political action committee is the Rely on Your Beliefs Fund.

On February 19, 2009, Blunt announced he would seek the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Kit Bond. Should he win his party's nomination, he will face Democratic Secretary of State Robin Carnahan, who in 2008 was elected to her second term with more votes received than any other candidate in the state's history.

Committee assignments

• Committee on Energy and Commerce
  • Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
  • Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet
  • Subcommittee on Health
• Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
  • Subcommittee on Intelligence Community Management
  • Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations

Positions and interest group ratings

Blunt has a conservative voting record. He is generally rated highly by conservative interest groups and receives correspondingly low ratings from liberal groups.

Social issues

Although Missouri Right to Life endorsed Webster over Blunt in the 1992 Republican gubernatorial primary, Blunt has voted pro-life in the House and has a conservative record on most other social issues. He has voted to ban partial-birth abortions and to restrict or criminalize transporting minors across state lines for the purpose of getting an abortion. He also voted in favor of the unsuccessful Federal Marriage Amendment which sought to place a national ban on same-sex marriage, and has voted against gay adoption. He received 94 percent lifetime and 96 percent 2004 ratings from the American Conservative Union, a 14 percent rating from the American Civil Liberties Union, and a 92 percent rating from the conservative Christian Coalition.

Education

Blunt has voted in favor of school prayer and supported the No Child Left Behind Act. He has voted in favor of school vouchers within the District of Columbia but has voted against broader legislation allowing states to use federal money to issue vouchers for private or religious schools. He has received a 17 percent rating from the National Education Association.

Guns

Blunt has voted to prohibit lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers if the guns they manufacture or sell are later used in a crime. He has also voted to reduce the waiting period for purchasing a gun from 72 hours to 24 hours. He has received an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association.

Business

Blunt received a 97 percent rating from the United States Chamber of Commerce indicating a pro-business voting record. He supported banking industry-backed efforts to overhaul U.S. bankruptcy laws, requiring consumers who seek bankruptcy protection to repay more of their debts.

Internet gambling

Blunt is a staunch advocate of a federal prohibition of online poker. In 2006, he cosponsored H.R. 4411, the Goodlatte-Leach Internet Gambling Prohibition Act and H.R. 4777, the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act.

Health care

Blunt, who chairs the House Republican Health Care Solutions Group, has opposed plans for health care reform supported by Democrats, including proposals that include a "public option" of medical insurance offered by the government. In July 2009 he suggested that the government should not have created Medicare and Medicaid, saying:

The government did get into the health care business in a big way in 1965 with Medicare and later with Medicaid. And government already distorts the marketplace. A government competitor would drive all of the other competitors away. What we should be doing is creating more competition.

Later that month, according to the Missouri Democratic Party, Blunt said, "We've had Medicare since 1965, and Medicare has never done anything to make people more healthy."

In August 2009, Blunt stated in two separate newspaper interviews that, because he was 59 years old, "In either Canada or Great Britain, if I broke my hip, I couldn't get it replaced." In fact, however, more than 60 percent of the hip replacements done in Canada and England are on patients age 65 or older. Blunt said in response that he had heard the statement in Congressional testimony by "some people who are supposed to be experts on Canadian health care." The PolitiFact service of the St. Petersburg Times reported that it could not find any such testimony.

Obama birth certificate

On July 29, 2009, when asked about Barack Obama's eligibility to be President, Blunt asserted that Obama had not released his birth certificate, and said, "What I don't know is why the president can't produce a birth certificate. I don't know anybody else that can't produce one. And I think that that's a legitimate question - no health records, no birth certificate." Blunt did vote in favor of a House resolution recognizing Hawaii as Obama's birthplace.

Controversies

Ties to the tobacco industry and lobbyists

In 2002, Blunt attempted to insert a provision, in support of tobacco corporations, into the legislation that created the Department of Homeland Security. The "rider" would have made tobacco sales over the Internet more difficult, allowing tobacco companies to control distribution. At the time, Blunt was dating Phillip Morris lobbyist Abigail Perlman, whom he later married. It was removed from the final bill by agreement between Blunt's staff and the Speaker's staff. The same basic provision was later adopted by the Senate and became law, restricting the ability of criminals and terrorists to use black market Internet sales of tobacco to underwrite illegal or nefarious activity.[23]

Citizens for Ethics released a report in June 2007 in which they pointed out that two of Blunt's children are lobbyists in addition to his wife.[24] Altria Group has made a $180,000 contribution to Blunt's PACs and is the largest donor to Blunt's campaigns, giving Blunt a total of $270,000 as of late 2006.[25] Son Andy Blunt is a lobbyist who has worked for Altria subsidiaries Kraft Foods, Miller Brewing, and Philip Morris, along with UPS. Blunt inserted a rider into an Iraq War appropriations bill in 2003 that benefited UPS.[24] Daughter Amy Blunt is a registered lobbyist for Lathrop & Gage.

Citing the Homeland Security rider benefiting his largest donor Altria Group and the rider inserted to benefit UPS and FedEx after receiving campaign contributions from the companies totaling $58,000, Citizens for Ethics in September 2006 called Blunt "one of the 20 most corrupt members of Congress."[25]

Ties to Tom DeLay

On November 16, 2005, Travis County, Texas District Attorney Ronnie Earle subpoenaed documents that purportedly show communication between DeLay's political action committee and that of Roy Blunt, which would not have been impermissible. The subpoenaed documents were bank records of DeLay's Americans for a Republican Majority PAC, which gave $75,000 to start Texans for a Republican Majority. Federal Election Commission records show that Blunt's PAC also paid roughly $88,000 in fees since 2003 to a consultant facing indictment in Texas in the same case as DeLay.[26]

In June 2003, since-imprisoned lobbyist Jack Abramoff persuaded DeLay to organize a letter, cosigned by Blunt, Speaker Dennis Hastert, and Deputy Whip Eric Cantor, that endorsed a view of gambling law benefitting Abramoff’s client, the Louisiana Coushatta, by blocking gambling competition by another tribe. Abramoff has donated $8,500 to Blunt’s leadership PAC, Rely on Your Beliefs Fund. However, Blunt had a long history of opposing gambling enterprises operated by Native Americans, due to the large presence of family-friendly tourism businesses in his Congressional district that includes Branson.[27]

DeLay said of Blunt: "Roy Blunt has done a tremendous job... His leadership is vital to our cause."[28]

Earmarking

In 2006 The Hill reported that "Blunt secured $80,000 to develop an industrial park, $1 million to improve waste-water treatment and $475,000 to renovate the Gillioz Theatre, as well as several defense-related earmarks. The Senate earmarked $250,000 for a natural-history museum in Springfield.[29]

Racism-Tinged Monkey Joke at DC Conference

In 2009, The Huffington Post reported that Blunt stated during a DC conference "I could go into great and long detail about how many things they did to try and eliminate the 'monkey problem.' But they never got it done, so finally this golf course and this golf course only, they passed a rule and the rule was - you have to play the ball where the monkey throws it. And that is the rule in Washington all the time." [1][2]

See also

• United States House of Representatives elections in Missouri, 2008

External links

• U.S. Congressman Roy Blunt official site
• Roy Blunt for Senate senatorial campaign website

• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Financial information (federal office) at the Federal Election Commission
• Profile at Vote Smart
• Profile at SourceWatch Congresspedia
• Beyond Delay — Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO) from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington
• Blunt candidacy to become official tomorrow