107 Facts About Jim Inhofe

James Mountain Inhofe is a retired American politician who served as a United States senator from Oklahoma from 1994 to 2023.

Jim Inhofe served in various elected offices in the state of Oklahoma for nearly sixty years, between 1966 and 2023.

Jim Inhofe's father, Perry Inhofe, was an owner of insurance companies and his mother, Blanche Inhofe, was a Tulsa socialite.

Jim Inhofe was a high school track star and graduated from Central High School.

Jim Inhofe went on to briefly attend the University of Colorado before finishing his college degree at the University of Tulsa.

Jim Inhofe was drafted to the United States Army in 1956 and served between 1957 and 1958.

Jim Inhofe became vice-president of his father's insurance company in 1961 and president after his father's death in 1970.

Jim Inhofe was an elected official representing the Tulsa area for nearly three decades.

Jim Inhofe represented parts of Tulsa in the Oklahoma House of Representatives from 1966 to 1969 and the Oklahoma Senate from 1969 to 1977.

Jim Inhofe was elected to three terms as the Mayor of Tulsa, serving between 1978 and 1984.

Jim Inhofe served in the United States House of Representatives representing from 1987 to 1994; he resigned after his election to the United States Senate.

Jim Inhofe chaired the US Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works from 2003 to 2007 and again from 2015 to 2017.

Jim Inhofe served as acting chairman of the Armed Services Committee between December 2017 and September 6,2018, while John McCain fought cancer.

James Mountain Jim Inhofe was born in Des Moines, Iowa, on November 17,1934, the son of Blanche and Perry Dyson Jim Inhofe.

Jim Inhofe moved with his family to Tulsa, Oklahoma, after his father became president of the National Mutual Casualty company in August 1942.

Jim Inhofe's father was active in the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce and YMCA; and he was the official sponsor of Miss Tulsa and Miss Oklahoma winner Louise O'Brien in 1950.

Jim Inhofe's mother was a Tulsa socialite and hosted guests such as Johnston Murray.

Jim Inhofe's family had been involved in Oklahoma politics since the 1950's.

James Jim Inhofe started kindergarten in Des Moines, Iowa, but moved halfway through the year to Hazel Dell in Springfield, Illinois.

Jim Inhofe skipped first grade after the schoolhouse burned down and started second grade after his family moved to Tulsa at Barnard Elementary School.

Jim Inhofe went on to attend Woodrow Wilson Junior High and Tulsa Central High School, where he was a member of his high school's track team.

Jim Inhofe attended the University of Colorado that fall for three months and worked as a bartender.

Jim Inhofe spent most of his time in the army stationed in Quartermaster Station in Fort Lee, Virginia.

In 1961, his father formed a new life insurance company, Quaker Insurance, and Jim Inhofe was the vice-president.

On June 17,1970, Perry Jim Inhofe died of a heart attack; James Jim Inhofe became president of Quaker Life Insurance and vice-president of Mid-Continental Casualty Co.

Jim Inhofe initially denied the stories that uncovered the discrepancy, but later acknowledged them.

In February 1966, Jim Inhofe launched his first campaign for office as a Republican; he ran for the Oklahoma House of Representatives's 71st district against incumbent Representative Warren Green.

Jim Inhofe lost the May primary election and then worked on J Robert Wooten's 1966 lieutenant gubernatorial campaign as the Tulsa County campaign chair.

Jim Inhofe was the first to announced his campaign for McGraw's former house seat.

Jim Inhofe won the Republican primary and the general election.

Jim Inhofe faced Madison J Bowers, who was endorsed by the Political Action Committee of Educators, in the Republican primary election.

Jim Inhofe won the primary and faced Democratic nominee Jerry L Goodman in the general election.

Republican party officials tried to recruit Jim Inhofe to run for Treasurer of Oklahoma in 1970, but he declined to run.

In 1971, Jim Inhofe served as the chairman of the Oklahoma Republican Party's State Convention.

In 1969, Jim Inhofe sponsored a successful bill to bring a retired US Navy submarine to Oklahoma.

Jim Inhofe initially wanted the USS Piranha for Tulsa, but it was determined that waters in the Arkansas River were too shallow for the ship to travel that far upriver.

In 1972, Inhofe was appointed to serve as co-chair for Richard Nixon's 1972 presidential campaign in Oklahoma with Ralph G Thompson.

Jim Inhofe worked on US Senator Dewey Bartlett's campaign as the co-chair for Oklahoma's 1st congressional district.

Jim Inhofe won the general election by over 7,000 votes; afterward, he was elected by fellow Republican State Senators to serve as the assistant floor leader in the 34th Oklahoma Legislature.

Jim Inhofe was elected minority leader of the Oklahoma Senate for the 35th Oklahoma Legislature to succeed Donald Ferrell who had lost re-election.

Newspapers in the state responded by pointing out Jim Inhofe had supported just as must spending; the article was syndicated by the Associated Press and Jim Inhofe responded by publishing a Tulsa World op-ed arguing he had tried to amend bills to remove wasteful spending and was consistently critical of spending.

Jim Inhofe did not seek a third term to the Oklahoma Legislature and was succeeded as minority leader by Senator Stephen Wolfe.

Jim Inhofe had been floated as a potential gubernatorial candidate since 1972.

Jim Inhofe was considered a strong Republican candidate with his only weaknesses being his feuding with Leo Winters and the backlash to the USS Batfish project.

In 1976, State Senator Frank Keating announced his campaign for Oklahoma's 1st congressional district and announced that Jim Inhofe would be the master of ceremonies of his campaign launch announcement; however, Jim Inhofe did not appear at Keating's announcement and instead announced was considering his own campaign.

Jim Inhofe officially announced his campaign on February 19,1976.

Jim Inhofe criticized Democratic presidential candidate, and US Senator from Oklahoma, Fred Harris during his presidential primary campaign.

Jim Inhofe criticized a donation Jones had received from Ross Perot, but he retracted his accusation the donation affected Jones voting record after threats from Perot and his lawyers.

Jim Inhofe was endorsed by the American Conservative Union and National Conservative Political Action Committee during the general election.

Jim Inhofe was endorsed by President Gerald Ford, US Representative John Rousselot, and the Tulsa Tribune.

In January 1978, the Tulsa Daily World reported Republican party officials were courting Jim Inhofe to run for Mayor of Tulsa.

In 1980, Jim Inhofe won his mayoral re-election campaign, fending off Democratic nominee Richard Johnson and Independent candidate Robert Murphy.

Jim Inhofe lost his 1984 re-election campaign to Terry Young.

In 1987 Jim Inhofe voted against President Ronald Reagan's budget, which included tax increases and no increase in defense spending.

Jim Inhofe first came to national attention in 1993, when he led the effort to reform the House's discharge petition rule, which the House leadership had long used to bottle up bills in committee.

Jim Inhofe served as the longest serving US Senator from Oklahoma serving between 1994 and 2023.

Jim Inhofe was elected Boren's successor in an election cycle that saw the Republican Party take both houses of Congress and the Oklahoma governorship.

Jim Inhofe was reelected in 2002,2008,2014, and 2020.

In 2006, Jim Inhofe was one of only nine senators to vote against the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, which prohibits "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of individuals in US Government custody.

When chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee John McCain was absent seeking medical treatment for brain cancer, Jim Inhofe became acting chairman of the committee.

McCain died in August 2018, and Jim Inhofe lauded him as his "hero".

Jim Inhofe said that McCain was "partially to blame for" the White House's controversial decision to raise flags back to full mast after less than two days, as McCain previously "disagreed with the President in certain areas and wasn't too courteous about it".

On March 6,2019, Jim Inhofe said he intended to put language in the next defense authorization act to reinforce Trump's decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear agreement and reintroduce severe sanctions on Tehran.

On July 15,2021, Jim Inhofe told Tulsa World he planned to retire at the end of his current term, in 2027.

In February 2022, The New York Times reported that Jim Inhofe was planning to resign at the end of the 117th Congress.

Jim Inhofe endorsed his former chief of staff, Luke Holland, in the special election.

Jim Inhofe was ranked the most conservative member of Congress on the 2017 GovTrack report card.

Since 2003, when he was first elected Chair of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Jim Inhofe was the foremost Republican promoting climate change denial.

Jim Inhofe famously claimed in the Senate that global warming is a hoax, invited contrarians to testify in Committee hearings, and spread his views via the Committee website run by Marc Morano as well as through his access to conservative media.

Jim Inhofe supported what he called "sound science", citing contrarian scientists such as Patrick Michaels, Fred Singer, Richard Lindzen and Sallie Baliunas as well as some mainstream scientists.

Two of these, Tom Wigley and Stephen Schneider, later issued statements that Jim Inhofe had misrepresented their work.

Jim Inhofe signed a poster for them, and thanked them for quoting him correctly.

Jim Inhofe said that in the 1960s the media had switched from warning of global warming to warning of global cooling and a coming ice age, then in the 1970s had returned to warming to promote "climate change fears".

In 2006, Jim Inhofe introduced Senate Amendment 4682 with Kit Bond, which would have modified oversight responsibility of the Army Corps of Engineers.

In May 2009, Jim Inhofe gave support to the idea that black carbon is a significant contributor to global warming.

On November 23,2009, as the Climatic Research Unit email controversy emerged, Jim Inhofe said the emails confirmed his view that scientists were "cooking the science".

Jim Inhofe was unable to secure meetings with any negotiators or delegations to the conference and only met with a small group of reporters.

On January 21,2015, Jim Inhofe returned to chairing the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works as part of a new Republican majority in the Senate.

On February 26,2015, Jim Inhofe brought a snowball to the Senate floor and tossed it before delivering remarks in which he said that environmentalists keep talking about global warming even though it keeps getting cold.

Jim Inhofe co-authored and was one of 22 senators to sign a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement.

Jim Inhofe has long supported the Polisario Front and has traveled to Algeria many times to meet with its leaders.

Jim Inhofe has urged Morocco to hold a referendum on Western Saharan independence.

In 2017, Inhofe blocked the Trump administration's nomination of J Peter Pham for Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, citing a disagreement over Western Sahara.

Jim Inhofe wrote the Jim Inhofe Amendment to the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006, which was debated in Congress in May 2006.

President Bill Clinton eventually appointed him in a recess appointment, making him the United States' first openly gay ambassador in June 1999, and angering Jim Inhofe, who held up seven more Clinton appointees in retaliation.

In 2015, Inhofe condemned the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v Hodges, which held that same-sex marriage bans violated the constitution.

In 1995, Jim Inhofe voted to ban affirmative action hiring with federal funds.

In 2001, Jim Inhofe voted to loosen restrictions on cell phone wiretapping.

In 1995, Jim Inhofe co-sponsored a constitutional amendment to the US Constitution that would give Congress and individual US states the power to prohibit the physical desecration of the American flag.

Jim Inhofe agreed to support legislation allowing military mental health specialists to talk with veterans about private firearms in an effort to reduce suicides.

Jim Inhofe was influential in Senate and Congressional debates involving aircraft regulation.

Jim Inhofe has said that he has made over 140 trips to Africa over about 20 years and helped to get United States Africa Command established.

Jim Inhofe has made multiple foreign trips, especially to Africa, on missions that he described as "a Jesus thing" and that were paid for by the US government.

Jim Inhofe has used these trips for activities on behalf of The Fellowship, a Christian organization.

Jim Inhofe consistently voted against federal disaster relief, most notably in the case of relief for the 24 states affected by Hurricane Sandy, but argued for federal aid when natural disasters hit Oklahoma.

On February 12,1999, Jim Inhofe was one of 50 senators to vote to convict and remove Bill Clinton from office.

Early during the Republican Party presidential primaries in 2016, Jim Inhofe endorsed fellow Republican John Kasich.

In December 2018, Jim Inhofe bought $50,000 to $100,000 worth of stock in Raytheon, a major defense contractor that has billions of dollars' worth of contracts with the Pentagon.

Jim Inhofe sold the stock shortly after reporters asked him about the purchase.

Jim Inhofe said the purchase was made by a third-party adviser who manages Inhofe's investments on his behalf.

In March 2016, around seven months before the next presidential election, Jim Inhofe argued that the Senate should not consider Obama's Supreme Court nominee because "we must let the people decide the Supreme Court's future" via the presidential election.

In September 2020, less than two months before the next presidential election, Jim Inhofe supported an immediate vote on Trump's nominee to fill the Supreme Court vacancy caused by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death.

On May 28,2021, Jim Inhofe abstained from voting on the creation of an independent commission to investigate the January 6 United States Capitol attack.

On December 19,1959, Jim Inhofe married Kay Kirkpatrick, with whom he has had four children.

Jim Inhofe has had his pilot's license since he was 28.

Jim Inhofe was the first recipient of the US Air Force Academy's Character and Leadership Award for his character and leadership in public service.

Jim Inhofe has symptoms of long COVID, which have severely limited his capacity to do day-to-day activities.