61 Facts About Pete Ricketts

John Peter Ricketts was born on August 19,1964 and is an American businessman and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Nebraska since 2023.

Pete Ricketts is, with other family members, a part owner of Major League Baseball's Chicago Cubs.

Pete Ricketts unsuccessfully ran for the US Senate in 2006, losing to incumbent Ben Nelson.

Pete Ricketts was a firm supporter of capital punishment, and in 2018 the state carried out its first execution since 1997.

Pete Ricketts left office after his second term as governor expired on January 5,2023; a week later he was appointed to the US Senate by his gubernatorial successor, Jim Pillen, to fill the vacancy created when Ben Sasse resigned to become president of the University of Florida.

Pete Ricketts was elected to complete Sasse's term in the 2024 special election, defeating Democratic nominee Preston Love Jr.

Pete Ricketts has announced he intends to seek a full Senate term in 2026.

Joe Pete Ricketts founded First Omaha Securities in 1975, one of the first discount stockbrokers in the United States.

Pete Ricketts attended the University of Chicago, receiving a BA in biology in 1986 and an MBA in marketing and finance in 1991.

Pete Ricketts worked for the Union Pacific Railroad for a year, then as a salesman for a Chicago environmental consultant.

At the time of her marriage to Pete Ricketts, she was working as a nurse at St Joseph's Hospital in Omaha.

In 2006, Pete Ricketts left Ameritrade to run for the US Senate.

In 2007, Pete Ricketts co-founded, and became director and president of the Platte Institute for Economic Research, which he called a "free market think tank", and which Nebraska newspapers have called "conservative".

Pete Ricketts resigned from the organization in 2013 to concentrate on his 2014 gubernatorial campaign.

From 2007 to 2012, Pete Ricketts was a national committeeman for the Republican National Committee; from 2007 to 2013, he was a trustee of the American Enterprise Institute.

Pete Ricketts stepped down from the Cubs' board of directors in 2019 to focus on being governor.

Pete Ricketts officially joined the race in September 2013, at which point he and state auditor Mike Foley were regarded as the front-runners in a race that included State Senators Charlie Janssen, Beau McCoy, and Tom Carlson.

Pete Ricketts advocated tax reductions; Hassebrook argued that Pete Ricketts's proposed cuts would primarily benefit the rich and deprive the state of funds for what he called needed public services.

Pete Ricketts opposed the proposed expansion of Medicaid under the provisions of the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act; Hassebrook favored the expansion.

Pete Ricketts opposed an increase in the state's minimum wage; Hassebrook supported it.

On June 5,2017, Pete Ricketts announced his candidacy for reelection.

Pete Ricketts asked Nebraskans to "rehire" Lieutenant Governor Mike Foley.

Pete Ricketts was inaugurated as the 40th governor of Nebraska at the Nebraska State Capitol on January 8,2015.

Capital-punishment opponents then filed a lawsuit arguing that the petition should be invalidated on the grounds that Pete Ricketts, who had contributed $200,000 to the campaign, was "the primary initiating force" for the petition drive and should have been included in the list of sponsors required by Nebraska law.

LB580 would have created an independent commission of citizens to draw new district maps following censuses; supporters described it as an attempt to depoliticize the redistricting process, while Pete Ricketts maintained that the bill delegated the legislature's constitutional duty of redistricting to "an unelected and unaccountable board".

At the 2016 Republican state convention, Pete Ricketts denounced several legislators who had failed to support his and the party's positions on various bills, and called for the election of more "platform Republicans" to the officially nonpartisan legislature.

Pete Ricketts signed both merger bills into law in the spring of 2017.

Pete Ricketts vetoed a notable bill, LB350, which would have allowed felons to petition a court to set aside their convictions after serving their sentences.

Pete Ricketts spearheaded the project to increase the Property Tax Credit Relief Fund by $51 million for a total of $550 million in direct property tax relief from 2019 to 2021.

Pete Ricketts merged two state agencies, the Department of Environment and the Department of Energy, into one, the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy.

In 2020, Pete Ricketts signed numerous laws passed by the legislature, including property and veterans tax relief bills, dismemberment abortion bans, and flood and pandemic relief.

In 2020, Pete Ricketts made some workforce reforms, providing a new partnership between Peru State College and the Nebraska Department of Corrections, to provide a path for students to go from the classroom into the corrections workforce.

Pete Ricketts signed an infrastructure bill, funding repair of the Gering-Fort Laramie Irrigation Canal after it collapsed in 2019.

In June 2020, Pete Ricketts threatened to withhold $100 million in federal COVID-19 relief if local governments in Nebraska required people who entered courthouses and other local government offices to wear face masks.

In October 2021, Pete Ricketts ordered Nebraska state agencies not to comply with the federal government's vaccine requirements for employees.

Pete Ricketts called the 2021 session "historic", as it fulfilled multiple priorities he highlighted in his January 2021 State of the State address.

Pete Ricketts signed legislation to support military spouses licensed in another state to obtain teaching permits after moving to Nebraska.

Pete Ricketts signed into law a bill that gives private schools $3 million in funding for textbook loans and $1 billion to support public K-12 education.

Pete Ricketts passed career scholarship reform, giving public, private, and community colleges and universities state scholarship support.

Pete Ricketts signed bills to further develop Nebraska's water infrastructure, construct new marinas at Lake McConaughy and Lewis and Clark Lake, and create a 3,600-acre reservoir between Lincoln and Omaha.

Pete Ricketts was the 2006 Republican nominee for the US Senate seat held by Democrat Ben Nelson.

Pete Ricketts ran on a conservative platform, emphasizing fiscal responsibility, immigration reform, and agriculture, as well as championing a socially conservative platform opposing same-sex marriage and abortion.

Pete Ricketts's appointment was controversial, as he had financially supported Pillen's 2022 gubernatorial campaign.

Pete Ricketts was sworn in as Nebraska's junior US senator by Vice President Kamala Harris on January 23,2023.

The first three pieces of legislation Pete Ricketts co-sponsored in the Senate were bills to permanently prohibit federal funding for abortion, make it a federal crime for physicians to perform an abortion on a minor from another state without parental consent, and reinstate the in-person dispensing requirement for abortion drugs.

Pete Ricketts criticized President Joe Biden for what he viewed as Biden's failures to address the border security crisis.

Pete Ricketts has co-sponsored legislation to create federal felony murder charges for drug dealers who distribute fentanyl that leads to an overdose death.

Pete Ricketts was the first member of his freshman class to deliver his maiden speech on March 29,2023.

In 2016, Pete Ricketts spent part of his family fortune to finance a referendum to reinstate capital punishment in the state.

Pete Ricketts criticized the impeachment of Donald Trump over his request that Ukraine start an investigation into his political rival Joe Biden.

Pete Ricketts said the impeachment proceedings were a "partisan impeachment parade" and praised the Senate for acquitting Trump.

Pete Ricketts has an "F" rating from the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws for his voting history regarding cannabis-related causes.

Pete Ricketts pointed to overdoses of the synthetic cannabinoid K2 as a "reminder of how dangerous cannabis can be".

Pete Ricketts opposed the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Pete Ricketts has been a vocal critic of what he calls "detached from reality" mandates from the Biden administration.

In July 2022, Pete Ricketts contributed $250,000 to a political action committee created to oppose the US Senate campaign of Eric Greitens in advance of Missouri's August primary election.

Pete Ricketts believes mental illness causes most mass shootings and has been critical of Biden's support for gun control.

Pete Ricketts is a proponent of fiscal conservatism and tax cuts.

Pete Ricketts signed legislation providing $12.7 billion in tax relief as governor of Nebraska.

Pete Ricketts was among the 31 Senate Republicans who voted against final passage of the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023.

Pete Ricketts is Catholic and is a member of the Knights of Columbus and a Knight of the Holy Sepulchre.