44 Facts About Jami-Lee Ross

Jami-Lee Matenga Ross was born on 1985 and is a New Zealand businessman and former politician.

Jami-Lee Ross was the Member of Parliament for Botany from a by-election in March 2011 until he lost his re-election bid at the 2020 general election.

Jami-Lee Ross sat in Parliament as an independent until 2020, when he formed the conspiracy theorist and electorally unsuccessful Advance New Zealand party.

Jami-Lee Ross was charged with electoral fraud in 2020 but found not guilty on the basis it was possible he had lied about his involvement in a donation-splitting scheme.

Jami-Lee Ross was brought up by his grandmother as his mother was "not in the best space to raise a child", and he has never met his father, who descends from the Maori iwi of Ngati Porou.

Jami-Lee Ross was raised in Manukau City, first in Papatoetoe then Pakuranga after his grandmother shifted houses so Ross, a keen swimmer, could be closer to a pool.

Jami-Lee Ross boarded at Dilworth School, where he was a swimming champion, before changing to Pakuranga College but left without formal qualifications.

Jami-Lee Ross obtained a commercial pilot's licence, having trained at Ardmore Flying School.

Jami-Lee Ross was married to Lucy Schwaner, a former member of the Howick Local Board, with whom he has two children.

Jami-Lee Ross was re-elected for a second term in 2007, in which he chaired the performance and accountability committee.

Jami-Lee Ross supported the amalgamation of Auckland councils into a single authority proposed by the Royal Commission on Auckland Governance, in opposition to his own council's proposal of three medium-sized authorities.

Jami-Lee Ross self-described as a fiscal conservative and stated that his view that local government should not provide social services and these should be left to central government.

In 2009, Jami-Lee Ross led criticism of Manukau mayor Len Brown's use of council credit cards for personal spending.

Jami-Lee Ross himself was accused of seeking reimbursement for frivolous spending, including $14 for self-driving to an Anzac Day ceremony.

Jami-Lee Ross stood for a place on the new Auckland Council in the 2010 Auckland local elections, winning one of two Howick ward seats alongside former Manuakau City councillor colleague Sharon Stewart.

Jami-Lee Ross announced his candidacy on 15 December and, with the support of right-wing strategists Simon Lusk and Cameron Slater, was selected on 27 January 2011 over former broadcaster Maggie Barry.

Jami-Lee Ross's candidacy was criticised because he had only been elected to Auckland Council seven weeks earlier on a platform of cutting spending, and a by-election to replace him on the council would cost about $150,000.

Jami-Lee Ross defeated Labour's Michael Wood in the 5 March 2011 by-election with a majority of 3,972.

Jami-Lee Ross began to pick up more duties in the management of party affairs.

Jami-Lee Ross was promoted to junior whip after his re-election in Botany at the 2014 general election, and succeeded Tim Macindoe as senior whip in May 2017.

Jami-Lee Ross was the final person to hold the office of chief whip during the Fifth National Government.

Jami-Lee Ross contested the Botany seat for a fourth time during the 2017 election and was re-elected.

Jami-Lee Ross supported Simon Bridges in the February 2018 New Zealand National Party leadership election and was ranked eighth within the Bridges shadow cabinet on 11 March, holding the transport and infrastructure portfolios and sitting as a National Party representative on the transport and infrastructure committee.

Jami-Lee Ross leveled complaints against the Counties Manukau District Health Board of "unauthorised, excessive or unjustified" payments made to senior executives and alleged the board's then chief executive Stephen McKernan, later the acting director-general of health, was involved.

On 2 October 2018, Jami-Lee Ross issued a statement that he was standing down from his portfolios and from the front bench of the Opposition due to personal health issues.

Jami-Lee Ross had denied being responsible for leaking the travel expenses but the investigation concluded two weeks later he was the leaker.

Jami-Lee Ross denied the accusations and issued a series of tweets alleging that Bridges had attempted to silence him for speaking out against his leadership decisions, including an election donation that allegedly broke the law.

Jami-Lee Ross stated that he had not been on medical leave but had been forced to take leave by Bridges and deputy leader Paula Bennett as part of an apparent smear attempt.

That same day, Jami-Lee Ross was expelled from National for disloyalty.

Jami-Lee Ross alleged she had been harassed by Ross before and after a failed vote to install Ross's wife as the board chair in 2016.

Jami-Lee Ross indicated that he was seeking legal options but admitted he had had two past extramarital affairs, including with a married MP later revealed to be Invercargill MP Sarah Dowie.

The police complaint that triggered the investigation was made anonymously and Jami-Lee Ross denied he had made it.

Ahead of her retirement from Parliament in 2020, Dowie claimed Jami-Lee Ross orchestrated the investigation and deliberately used his mental health as a cover to seek revenge against her.

When Jami-Lee Ross returned to Parliament in February 2019, he said he would focus on advocating for more funding for mental health and on electoral reform.

Jami-Lee Ross voted in favour of the End of Life Choice Bill in 2019 and the Abortion Legislation Bill in 2020.

Jami-Lee Ross rejected the committee's decision, denouncing the committee as a "kangaroo court".

Jami-Lee Ross had planned to re-contest Botany for Advance New Zealand in the October 2020 New Zealand general election but, one month before the election, announced he had pulled out of that race.

The day after the election, Jami-Lee Ross was interviewed by Newshub journalist Tova O'Brien, who criticised him for "peddling misinformation" about COVID-19 and challenged his decision to ally with Te Kahika.

Jami-Lee Ross stated that he planned to rest after the election.

The final 17 days of Jami-Lee Ross's failed campaign was portrayed in Tony Sutoris's 2023 fly-on-the-wall documentary Elements of Truth.

On 19 February 2020, it was reported that Jami-Lee Ross was one of the four charged and the charges related to a NZ$105,000 donation made to the National Party in June 2018.

In late July 2022, Jami-Lee Ross was one of seven defendants in a High Court case involving three donations made to the Labour and National parties between 2017 and 2018.

The Crown accused Jami-Lee Ross of serving as Zhang's insider within the National Party when the latter made two donations worth over NZ$100,000 in 2017 and 2018.

The trial took ten weeks; Jami-Lee Ross's defense was that he had lied to the SFO in order to save his political career and seek revenge against Bridges, and that the statements underpinning the Crown's case were unreliable.