1. Chris Penk attended Kelston Boys' High School and graduated from the University of Auckland with a Bachelor of Arts in 1999 and a Bachelor of Laws with Honours in 2010.
20 Facts About Chris Penk
1. 2.
Chris Penk joined the Royal New Zealand Navy, serving as an officer on HMNZS Te Kaha.
3.
Chris Penk was an aide-de-camp for Governor-General Silvia Cartwright, before joining the Australian Defence Force for four years.
4.
Chris Penk's father, Stephen, is an Associate Dean at the University of Auckland's Law School and his brother Alex is a lawyer.
5.
Chris Penk was ranked 68th on the National Party's party list and was not elected to Parliament.
6.
Chris Penk won selection as National's Helensville candidate for the 2017 election, replacing former prime minister John Key.
7.
Chris Penk won Helensville, defeating Labour's candidate Kurt Taogaga by margin of 14,608 votes.
8.
Chris Penk was appointed National's shadow attorney-general and elected chair of parliament's regulations review committee, which he held from November 2020 until October 2022.
9.
Judith Collins said her office asked Chris Penk to take down the tweet.
10.
On 12 August 2023, Chris Penk made an online comment "Sorry but your poor ratings crashed an entire radio station" in response to an article by Tova O'Brien about National Party election strategy.
11.
Chris Penk was elected for a third term at the 2023 New Zealand general election, retaining Kaipara ki Mahurangi for National.
12.
Chris Penk defeated Labour's candidate Guy Wishart by a margin of 19,459 votes.
13.
In early July 2024, Chris Penk announced that the Government would make remote virtual inspections the default for building consents across New Zealand in an effort to accelerate the building process.
14.
In mid July, Chris Penk confirmed that the Government was exploring plans to reduce new insulation standards introduced in May 2023 with the goal of making newer houses more affordable and accelerating the home construction process.
15.
In December 2024, in his role as Associate Minister of Immigration, Chris Penk intervened to approve the visa application of controversial American commentator and speaker Candace Owens, whose visa had previously been declined by Immigration New Zealand in November on the grounds that she had been denied entry to Australia for reasons that included denying the impact of the Holocaust and claiming that Muslims started slavery.
16.
Owens had submitted a request for ministerial intervention to Chris Penk asking him to exercise his discretionary powers and grant her a visa.
17.
In mid-February 2025, Chris Penk was criticised by lawyer Alastair McClymont for defending an Immigration New Zealand decision to commence deportation proceedings against an 18-year old New Zealand-born teenager named Daman Kumar.
18.
Chris Penk was one of only eight MPs to vote against the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Act 2022.
19.
Chris Penk voted against it at its first reading in July 2021, for it at its second reading, and against it at its third and final reading in February 2022.
20.
Chris Penk married Newshub journalist Kim Choe; their first child was born shortly before the 2017 election.