John Cornyn facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
John Cornyn
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Official portrait, 2017
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| Chair of the Senate Narcotics Caucus | |
| Assumed office January 3, 2025 |
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| Preceded by | Sheldon Whitehouse |
| In office January 3, 2019 – January 20, 2021 |
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| Preceded by | Chuck Grassley |
| Succeeded by | Sheldon Whitehouse |
| Ranking Member of the Senate Narcotics Caucus | |
| In office January 20, 2021 – January 3, 2023 |
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| Preceded by | Dianne Feinstein |
| Succeeded by | Chuck Grassley |
| Senate Majority Whip | |
| In office January 3, 2015 – January 3, 2019 |
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| Leader | Mitch McConnell |
| Preceded by | Dick Durbin |
| Succeeded by | John Thune |
| Senate Minority Whip | |
| In office January 3, 2013 – January 3, 2015 |
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| Leader | Mitch McConnell |
| Preceded by | Jon Kyl |
| Succeeded by | Dick Durbin |
| Chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee | |
| In office January 3, 2009 – January 3, 2013 |
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| Preceded by | John Ensign |
| Succeeded by | Jerry Moran |
| United States Senator from Texas |
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| Assumed office December 2, 2002 Serving with Ted Cruz
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| Preceded by | Phil Gramm |
| 49th Attorney General of Texas | |
| In office January 13, 1999 – December 1, 2002 |
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| Governor | George W. Bush Rick Perry |
| Preceded by | Dan Morales |
| Succeeded by | Greg Abbott |
| Justice of the Texas Supreme Court | |
| In office January 2, 1991 – October 18, 1997 |
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| Preceded by | Franklin Spears |
| Succeeded by | Deborah Hankinson |
| Judge of the Texas 37th Judicial District Court | |
| In office January 1, 1985 – January 1, 1991 |
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| Preceded by | Richard Woods |
| Succeeded by | Ann-Marie Aaron |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
John Cornyn III
February 2, 1952 Houston, Texas, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse |
Sandy Hansen
(m. 1979) |
| Children | 2 |
| Education | Trinity University (BA) St. Mary's University, Texas (JD) University of Virginia (LLM) |
John Cornyn III (/ˈkɔːrnɪn/ KOR-nin; born February 2, 1952) is an American politician, attorney, and former jurist serving as the senior United States senator from Texas, a seat he has held since 2002. A member of the Republican Party, he served on the Texas Supreme Court from 1991 to 1997 and as the attorney general of Texas from 1999 to 2002.
Born in Houston, Cornyn is a graduate of Trinity University and St. Mary's University School of Law and received an LL.M. degree from the University of Virginia School of Law. He was a judge on Texas's 37th District Court from 1985 to 1991. He was elected an associate justice of the Texas Supreme Court, where he served from 1991 to 1997.
In 1998, Cornyn was elected Attorney General of Texas, serving one term before winning a seat in the U.S. Senate in 2002. He was reelected in 2008, 2014, and 2020. Cornyn chaired the National Republican Senatorial Committee from 2009 to 2013, and served as the Senate majority whip for the 114th and 115th Congresses.
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Early life, education, and legal career
Cornyn was born in Houston, the second child of Atholene Gale Cornyn (née Danley) and John Cornyn II, a colonel in the U.S. Air Force. He attended the American School in Japan after his family moved to Tokyo in 1968, and graduated from it in 1969. In 1973, he graduated from Trinity University, where he majored in journalism and was a member of Chi Delta Tau. Cornyn earned a Juris Doctor from St. Mary's University School of Law in 1977 and an LL.M. from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1995. He was named the St. Mary's Distinguished Law School Graduate in 1994, and a Trinity University Distinguished Alumnus in 2001.
In 1988, Cornyn attended a two-week seminar at Oxford University, jointly hosted by the National Judicial College at the University of Nevada, Reno and Florida State University’s College of Law. The seminar, held on the Oxford campus, was not academically affiliated with the university.
Cornyn served as a district judge in San Antonio for six years before being elected as a Republican in 1990 to the Texas Supreme Court, on which he served for seven years.
Texas attorney general
1998 election
In 1998, Cornyn ran for Texas attorney general. In the March Republican primary, Railroad Commissioner Barry Williamson received 38% of the vote, and Cornyn, a former Texas Supreme Court justice, received 32%. In the April runoff election, Cornyn defeated Williamson, 58% to 42%. Cornyn won the general election with 54% of the vote; he defeated Jim Mattox, a former Texas attorney general (1983–1991) and U.S. representative. Cornyn was the first Republican-elected attorney general of Texas since Reconstruction, and was sworn in by Governor George W. Bush.
Tenure
In September 2000, Cornyn created the Texas Internet Bureau to investigate illegal internet practices. The Internet Bureau was funded through an $800,000 grant from Governor Bush’s office, and its mission was to "help fight cybercrime in Texas, including consumer fraud, hacker break-ins, and online child exploitation". Cornyn investigated fraudulent Medicare and Medicaid claims.
In 2005, Cornyn was mentioned as a possible replacement for Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and William Rehnquist.
United States Senate
Elections
2002
In the 2002 Republican primary, Cornyn faced five opponents. Cornyn defeated his closest Republican challenger, the self-financed, Dallas-based international physician Bruce Rusty Lang, by a ten-to-one margin. In the general election, Cornyn defeated Democratic nominee Ron Kirk in a campaign that cost each candidate over $9 million.
2008
Texas had not elected a Democrat in a statewide election since 1994, and according to Rasmussen Reports polling, Cornyn had an approval rating of 50% in October 2008. Christian activist Larry Kilgore of Mansfield challenged Cornyn in the Republican primary, but Cornyn easily defeated him. Texas Representative Rick Noriega won the March 4 Democratic primary against Gene Kelly, Ray McMurrey, and Rhett Smith. Yvonne Adams Schick was the Libertarian Party's nominee, and the Green Party of Texas sought ballot access for its candidate, David B. Collins. The same Rasmussen poll showed Cornyn leading Noriega 47% to 43%, suggesting that the race might prove unexpectedly competitive, but most polls showed a much wider margin, and Cornyn was reelected.
2014
Cornyn was reelected in 2014, and according to the Dallas Morning News, "never broke a sweat." He won the March Republican primary with 59% of the vote against Houston-area congressman Steve Stockman. In the general election, he raised $14 million, outspending Democratic nominee David Alameel by nearly 3-1. Cornyn won again by over 20 points.
2020
Cornyn was reelected to a fourth term in 2020 in the closest of his Senate campaigns. He won the primary with 76% of the vote, and then defeated Democrat MJ Hegar in a race that the Cook Political Report had initially rated "Likely Republican" but then shifted to "Lean Republican". Cornyn received 5,962,983 votes—more than any Republican Senate candidate had ever received before, breaking the record set by Pete Wilson of California in 1988. Hegar also set a record, getting more votes than any losing Democrat since Leo T. McCarthy in the 1988 California Senate race.
Tenure
In 2004, Cornyn co-founded and became the co-chairman of the U.S. Senate India Caucus. In December 2006, he was selected by his colleagues to join the five-person Republican Senate leadership team as Vice Chairman of the Senate Republican Conference.
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As chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, Cornyn was a strong supporter of Norm Coleman's various court challenges to the 2008 election certification of the Minnesota U.S. Senate race. Cornyn advocated for Coleman to bring the case before the federal court and said the trial and appeals could take years to complete. Cornyn threatened that Republicans would wage a "World War III" if Senate Democrats had attempted to seat Democratic candidate Al Franken before the appeals were complete. Coleman conceded after the Minnesota Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Franken had won the election.
Cornyn voted to confirm Samuel Alito as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court and John Roberts as Chief Justice. In September 2005, during Roberts's Supreme Court hearings, Cornyn's staff passed out bingo cards to reporters. He asked them to stamp their card every time a Democrat on the Judiciary Committee used terms such as "far right" or "extremist". On July 24, 2009, Cornyn announced his intention to vote against President Obama's Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, saying that she might rule "from a liberal, activist perspective".
On the day of Obama's inauguration, it was reported that Cornyn would prevent Hillary Clinton from being confirmed as secretary of state by unanimous floor vote that day. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's spokesman reported to the Associated Press that a roll call vote for the Clinton confirmation would be held instead on the following day, January 21, 2009, and that it was expected Clinton would "receive overwhelming bipartisan support". The vote was 94–2 in her favor, with only Senators Jim DeMint and David Vitter voting in opposition.
On March 18, 2020, Cornyn blamed the COVID-19 pandemic on cultural practices in China and mistakenly blamed China for the MERS and swine flu epidemics. His comments were criticized by some Democrats and the National Council of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. At the time, the consensus among researchers was that coronavirus had originated at a wet market in Wuhan, China.
Senate Majority Whip
On November 14, 2012, Cornyn was elected Senate Minority Whip by his peers.
Cornyn was named Senate Majority Whip after the 2014 election, in which Republicans gained a Senate majority.
After the death of Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in February 2016, Cornyn said that anyone Obama nominated to replace him would have a difficult confirmation process and feel like a piñata. He also said that no serious candidate would accept a nomination knowing that they would not be confirmed. When Obama nominated Merrick Garland to replace Scalia, Cornyn said that even if the president has the constitutional authority to nominate someone, the Senate has full authority on how to proceed. Cornyn also said that the voice of the people should play a role, and that the "only way to empower the American people" was having the vacancy be filled by the winner of the upcoming presidential election, so no hearings on Garland should be held. The Senate did not vote on Garland's nomination, which expired after the November election of President Donald Trump. Trump nominated Neil Gorsuch to the seat, and Gorsuch was confirmed. In September 2020, Cornyn supported a vote on Trump's nominee to fill the Supreme Court vacancy caused by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. In March 2016, he took the position that the Senate should not consider Obama's Supreme Court nominee.
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On June 8, 2017, during a committee hearing whose announced topic was the Russian interference in the 2016 election and Comey's dismissal as FBI director, Cornyn opted instead to spend his time questioning James Comey on Hillary Clinton's email controversy.
In September 2018, during the Supreme Court nomination hearings for Brett Kavanaugh, Cornyn accused the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee of devolving into mob rule by breaking the rules of decorum when asking for postponement or adjournment of the hearing to obtain or review documents from Kavanaugh's time working for the George W. Bush administration. Cornyn said that it was hard to believe the Democrats' claim that they could not properly assess Kavanaugh without the documents because it seemed that their minds were already made up.
2024 Senate Majority Leader election
In February 2024, Cornyn announced he would run for Republican leader after Mitch McConnell announced he would step down from his position at the end of the year.
Following the 2024 U.S. elections, in which the Republicans carried the Senate, Cornyn was one of three announced candidates vying to be the next Senate Majority Leader. The others were Rick Scott and John Thune.
On November 12, 2024, Senator Mike Lee hosted a candidates forum, and the election took place the next day. It was held in a closed-door Republican caucus setting, and senators' votes were not publicized. Cornyn lost to Thune on the second ballot, 24-29.
Committee assignments
Source:
- United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
- Committee on Finance
- Subcommittee on Energy, Natural Resources, and Infrastructure
- Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness
- Subcommittee on Taxation and IRS Oversight
- Committee on the Judiciary
- Subcommittee on the Constitution
- Subcommittee on Criminal Justice and Counterterrorism
- Subcommittee on Immigration, Refugees and Border Security (ranking member)
- Subcommittee on Intellectual Property
- Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law
- Caucus on International Narcotics Control
Political positions
Civil rights and law enforcement
Cornyn sponsored a bill to allow law enforcement to force anyone arrested or detained by federal authorities to provide samples of their DNA, which would be recorded in a central database. He voted to recommend a constitutional ban on flag desecration and for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman. He also voted for the reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act and extending its wiretap provision.
Economy
Cornyn voted to permanently repeal the estate tax and raise the estate tax exemption to $5 million. He voted in favor of $350 billion in tax cuts over 11 years and supported making the George W. Bush tax cuts permanent. He opposed extending the 2011 payroll tax holiday. He voted for the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 but against the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009.
In 2008, Cornyn voted for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), also known as the Wall Street bailout, and later voted to end the program.
Environment
Cornyn voted against a measure recognizing that climate change is manmade. He was one of 22 senators to sign a letter to Trump urging him to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement. In May 2019, Cornyn said it was important that the United States take measures to combat climate change, but condemned the Green New Deal as proposed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. In April 2020, he incorrectly stated that climate scientists' models of the effects of climate change do not use the "scientific method".
In 2005, Cornyn voted against including oil and gas smokestacks in mercury regulations. He voted against factoring global warming into federal project planning, and against banning drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He also voted against removing oil and gas exploration subsidies. During his tenure in the Senate, Cornyn has scored 0% on the League of Conservation Voters' environmental scorecard, a system of ranking politicians according to their voting record on environmental legislation.
Health care
Cornyn opposes the Affordable Care Act. He voted against it in 2009, and played a leading role in the attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act in 2017. He voted against the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. Cornyn said that Senator Ted Cruz's 2013 efforts to defund the Affordable Care Act by threatening to default on the U.S. government's debt obligations were "unachievable", adding, "the shutdown did not help our cause. What did help our cause was the president's implementation of the Affordable Care Act, which has overwhelmed everything else. I don't hear anyone thinking that another government shutdown is the way to achieve our goals." Cornyn joined other Republican leaders to block Cruz's procedural move to reject an increase in the debt ceiling.
Guns
In January 2014, Cornyn introduced the "Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act". The bill would provide interstate reciprocity for persons with concealed weapons permits. Cornyn described the bill: "It's like a driver's license. It doesn't trump state laws. Say you have a carry permit in Texas; then you use it in another state that has a concealed-carry law." He received an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association in 2003 and 2014; as of 2018[update] his NRA rating was "A+". Cornyn continued to support Concealed Carry Reciprocity as of 2018, with the Republican-held House of Representatives passing a bill in late 2017 with this language attached to gun control measures from the Senate's Fix NICS bill.
In 2017, Cornyn helped Democrats pass legislation designed to aid federal agencies in alerting, reporting and recording gun purchases by creating a universal cross-agency database.
In 2022, Cornyn opposed background check laws and those limiting the types of weapons that adults may purchase. He later became one of ten Republican senators to support a bipartisan agreement on gun control, which included a red flag provision, support for state crisis intervention orders, funding for school safety resources, stronger background checks for buyers under 21, and penalties for straw purchases.
Personal life
Cornyn and his wife, Sandy Hansen, have two daughters. Cornyn receives pensions from three separate state and local governments in addition to his Senate salary.
As of 2018, according to OpenSecrets.org, Cornyn's net worth was more than $1.8 million.
