Jeffery Merkley - OpenCongress Wiki
Jeffery Merkley
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Jeff Merkley is a Democratic candidate in the 2008 congressional elections for the Senate in Oregon. He is seeking the Democratic nomination to challenge incumbent Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Ore.). Jeff Merkley was victorious in the primary which occurred on May 20, 2008. [1]
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Positions, record and controversies
To hear Jeff Merkley's full position on numerous issues, please visit http://www.jeffmerkley.com/2007/11/jeff_merkley_on_1.php.
Bio
As our U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley will bring people together to take on the special interests and fight for regular hardworking Oregonians.
Jeff Merkley will deliver the change we need in Washington. He will stand up to the big insurance and drug companies to make health care more affordable and accessible for all of us. He will fight to fix unfair trade deals that have cost Oregon 70,000 manufacturing jobs and will eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas. And Jeff will work to end the war in Iraq, bring our sons and daughters home, and fulfill the commitment we have made to our veterans and men and women in uniform.
Born in the small town of Myrtle Creek, Jeff Merkley has spent his lifetime fighting for change for Oregon families. The son of a sawmill worker, he spent his early years in Roseburg, where the children of loggers and mill workers learned the value of honest work, good schools, and strong families. Jeff worked hard, earned scholarships and became the first in his family to go to college. He went on to serve as a national security analyst, first for the Pentagon and then for Congress. After returning to Oregon with his wife Mary, Jeff led Habitat for Humanity and worked with low-income families to rebuild neighborhoods and purchase their first home.
A fighter for change, Jeff became tired of gridlock in government and sought to end the bickering. Nearly two years ago, Jeff led a band of new leaders to take control of the Oregon House and end the gridlock in state government. As the first Democratic speaker in sixteen years, Merkley brought Democrats, Republicans and citizens together to make real progress addressing Oregon’s challenges.
The Oregonian called Jeff’s session as Speaker, “Oregon's most productive in a generation.”
As Speaker, Jeff helped lead the fight against special interests to make health care more affordable, clamp down on pay day loan scams, pass landmark environmental legislation, and create thousands of family-wage jobs in Oregon. Working together, Oregonians achieved results – restoring fiscal responsibility by creating the state’s first “rainy day fund,” cutting taxes for working people, and passing sweeping ethics reform to clean up government.
In the U.S. Senate Jeff Merkley will continue to bring Democrats, Republicans, and independents together to find solutions to the problems we face – not only for his own children, Jonathan and Brynne, but for every child and family in Oregon.
More than 300,000 nurses, firefighters, teachers, steelworkers, electricians, truck drivers, and thousands more working families across Oregon have joined Senator Barack Obama and Senator Ron Wyden to endorse Jeff Merkley's campaign. Environmentalists from the Sierra Club and League of Conservation Voters have endorsed Jeff’s leadership protecting our environment. And Planned Parenthood of Oregon and NARAL Pro-Choice America have endorsed Jeff and his 100% record protecting a woman’s right to choose.
Today, Speaker Merkley lives in East Multnomah County with Mary, a professional nurse, and their two children, Jonathan age twelve and Brynne age ten.
2008 elections
Merkley is seeking the Democratic nomination to challenge Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Ore.) in the 2008 congressional elections.[2][3]
Money in politicsThis section contains links to – and feeds from – money in politics databases. For specific controversies, see this article's record and controversies section. Campaign contributionsThe following is drawn from government records of campaign contributions to Jeffery Merkley. Campaign contributions are one of the most direct conduits for influencing members of Congress. How to use this information.
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Committees and affiliations
Committees
Merkley will be assigned committees if and when he is elected to Congress.
Affiliations
More background data
Contact
To contact the Merkley campaign, visit http://www.jeffmerkley.com/2007/09/contact_us.php.
Articles and resources
Related SourceWatch articles
Sources
- ↑ "Live Oregon Primary Results", Oregon Live, May 20, 2008
- ↑ 2008 Race Tracker page on Oregon's Senate Race
- ↑ Aaron Blake. "Oregon House Speaker Merkley set to challenge Sen. Smith in 2008," The Hill. July 26, 2007.
External resources
External articles
- Aaron Blake. "Oregon House Speaker Merkley set to challenge Sen. Smith in 2008," The Hill. July 26, 2007.
