1. Cornelis Piet Hoekstra is a Dutch-American politician who served as the United States Ambassador to the Netherlands from January 10,2018, to January 17,2021.
52 Facts About Pete Hoekstra
1. 2.
In 1992, Hoekstra ran for the US House, defeating thirteen-term incumbent Guy Vander Jagt in the Republican primary and Democratic opponent John H Miltner in the general election.
3.
Pete Hoekstra was the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee from 2004 to 2007.
4.
Pete Hoekstra was a candidate for governor in Michigan's 2010 gubernatorial election, but came in second to Rick Snyder in the Republican primary.
5.
Pete Hoekstra was the Republican nominee for the United States Senate in 2012, losing to Democratic incumbent Debbie Stabenow in the general election.
6.
In July 2017, Pete Hoekstra was nominated to be United States ambassador to the Netherlands by President Donald Trump.
7.
On January 20,2024, Pete Hoekstra was elected chair of the Michigan Republican Party.
8.
Pete Hoekstra is listed as a "contributor" to Project 2025.
9.
On November 20,2024, Pete Hoekstra was nominated to be the United States ambassador to Canada by President-elect Trump.
10.
Pete Hoekstra moved to the US with his parents at the age of three, and Anglicized his name to Peter Hoekstra.
11.
Pete Hoekstra graduated from Holland Christian High School in 1971.
12.
Pete Hoekstra received a Bachelor of Arts in political science from Hope College in 1975 and an MBA from the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business in 1977.
13.
Pete Hoekstra then joined office furniture maker Herman Miller and remained there for 15 years, eventually becoming vice president of marketing.
14.
In 1992, Pete Hoekstra made his first bid for public office in the 2nd District.
15.
Pete Hoekstra rode his bicycle across the district, charging that Vander Jagt had served in Congress for too long; Vander Jagt had won his first election in 1966, when Pete Hoekstra was 13 years old.
16.
Pete Hoekstra scored a monumental upset, winning by almost six percent.
17.
Pete Hoekstra dominated the district's more populated southern portion; Vander Jagt's margins in the northern portion, his longtime base, weren't enough to close the gap.
18.
Pete Hoekstra continued to ride his bicycle across the district every summer, and biked across the state for his gubernatorial campaign.
19.
When he was first elected, Pete Hoekstra initially pledged to serve no more than six terms in the House.
20.
Pete Hoekstra faced no significant opposition in the Republican primary or in the general election and went on to secure his seventh term.
21.
Pete Hoekstra ran for re-election in 2008 against Fred Johnson, associate professor of History at Hope College.
22.
Pete Hoekstra had a conservative voting record, consistent with the conservative nature of the 2nd congressional district.
23.
Pete Hoekstra opposed abortion rights, opposed expanding health care benefits for children, opposed gay adoption rights and gay marriage, and voted against paid parental leave for federal employees.
24.
Pete Hoekstra consistently opposed gun control during his tenure, earning an A rating from the NRA Political Victory Fund.
25.
Pete Hoekstra was a proponent of the claim that the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, and held onto this belief even after no WMDs were found in the wake of the Iraq invasion.
26.
In 2006, Pete Hoekstra made headlines by announcing at a press conference in the Capitol that weapons of mass destruction had been located in Iraq in the form of 500 chemical weapons.
27.
The media had already reported on these munitions when Pete Hoekstra made his announcement that the weapons had been discovered.
28.
On December 27,2009, Pete Hoekstra commented on reports that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who had allegedly tried to set off a suicide bomb on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 on December 25,2009, had subsequently confessed to being trained and equipped in Yemen.
29.
Pete Hoekstra called for a halt to the repatriation of Yemeni captives in Guantanamo.
30.
Pete Hoekstra was a founding member of the Congressional House Tea Party Caucus in 2010.
31.
In December 2008, Pete Hoekstra said he would not seek re-election to his US House seat in 2010, and instead campaign to be Michigan's governor.
32.
Pete Hoekstra joined Mike Bouchard, the Oakland County Sheriff and former state senator, former Gateway, Inc president Rick Snyder, State Senator Tom George and Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox as 2010 Republican gubernatorial candidates.
33.
Pete Hoekstra was suggested as a possible challenger for Democratic incumbent Debbie Stabenow in the 2012 Senate election, but he initially declined to run.
34.
Pete Hoekstra later changed his mind and decided to challenge Stabenow in the election.
35.
Pete Hoekstra faced Stabenow and four third-party candidates in the general election.
36.
Pete Hoekstra targeted Democratic incumbent Debbie Stabenow with a television ad which ran statewide during the 2012 Super Bowl.
37.
Pete Hoekstra initially stood by the ad, claiming it hit Stabenow "smack dab between the eyes" on the economy.
38.
However, on February 10,2012, Pete Hoekstra shut down his controversial Chinese-themed website and phased in a new TV commercial in place of his original ad.
39.
In February 2011, Pete Hoekstra joined the government relations group and Washington, DC law firm Dickstein Shapiro, and was named a visiting distinguished fellow at the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation, concentrating on education reform.
40.
In 2014, Pete Hoekstra left Dickstein Shapiro to join one of its rivals, Greenberg Traurig.
41.
Pete Hoekstra joined Steven Emerson's Investigative Project on Terrorism in 2014 as a Shillman Senior Fellow, specializing in national security, international relations, global terrorism and cyber security.
42.
Pete Hoekstra published his first book in October 2015, Architects of Disaster: The Destruction of Libya with Terri Blumenfeld.
43.
CNN stated that Pete Hoekstra was a frequent guest on a talk show hosted by Frank Gaffney, an anti-Muslim conspiracy theorist based in Washington.
44.
On March 11,2017, Pete Hoekstra said that Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, and other leakers of government materials, having illegally released classified information, were traitors and should have taken their evidence to the intelligence committees of the US Congress for proper investigations.
45.
On July 24,2017, President Donald Trump nominated Pete Hoekstra to be United States ambassador to the Netherlands.
46.
Pete Hoekstra was confirmed by the Senate on November 9 via voice vote and sworn in by Vice President Mike Pence on December 11,2017.
47.
On January 10,2018, during his press conference after presenting his credentials to King Willem-Alexander, Pete Hoekstra said that he did not want to revisit the comments made in 2015.
48.
In May 2020, Pete Hoekstra was interviewed by party leader Thierry Baudet on the party's video channel and he was a guest speaker at the party's conference in November 2019.
49.
On January 20,2024, Pete Hoekstra was elected chair of the Michigan Republican Party.
50.
On November 20,2024, Pete Hoekstra was announced as the United States ambassador to Canada by President-elect Trump.
51.
Pete Hoekstra's nomination is pending before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
52.
Pete Hoekstra declared that Canada should remain in the Five Eyes alliance despite media reports that White House officials wanted to suspend the country's participation in the alliance.