Anne Northup

 

Anne Northup
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Kentucky's 3rd district
In office 1997–2007
Preceded by	Mike Ward
Succeeded by	John Yarmuth
Born	January 22 1948 (1948--) (age 59) Louisville, Kentucky
Political party	Republican
Spouse	Woody Northup
Religion	Roman Catholic

Anne Meagher Northup (born January 22 1948) is an American Republican politician from the state of Kentucky. From 1997 to 2007, she represented the Louisville-centered 3rd congressional district of Kentucky in the United States House of Representatives, where she served on the powerful House Appropriations Committee. She narrowly lost reelection to Democratic politician John Yarmuth in the 2006 election. She then ran for governor, losing by 15 points to embattled Governor of Kentucky Ernie Fletcher in the Republican primary election for the 2007 Kentucky gubernatorial election. Prior to her election to the United States House of Representatives, Northup had served in the Kentucky House of Representatives.

Personal

Northup was born to a large family, having nine sisters and a brother, and grew up in St. Matthews, a suburb of Louisville. Northup was educated at Sacred Heart Academy and Saint Mary's College, earning a bachelor's degree in economics and business.She married Woody Northup, who attended nearby Notre Dame, and they have six children. One of her sisters is Mary T. Meagher, who won three gold medals in swimming (butterfly) in the 1984 Summer Olympics, as well as a bronze in 1988.^[1]

She was one of the wealthiest members of the House of Representatives, ranking 34th out of the 435 — with assets of $4.4 million to $15.9 million — based on financial disclosure statements made for the 2006 campaign.^[1]

Political career

Northup first became active in politics as a volunteer for Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign. She was elected to the Kentucky General Assembly in 1987 where she served as Representative of Kentucky's 32nd House district until 1996.^[1]

She was elected to the United States House in 1996, narrowly defeating one-term Democratic incumbent Mike Ward. The seat had been held for the previous 24 years by Democrat Ron Mazzoli.

2007 gubernatorial campaign

Main article: Kentucky gubernatorial election, 2007

On January 17, 2007 Northup entered the Republican primary election for Governor of Kentucky. Northup's running mate was State Representative Jeff Hoover of Jamestown, Kentucky, Republican leader in the Kentucky House.^[2] Northup received endorsements from prominent Kentucky Republicans including U.S. Senator Jim Bunning^[3] and Lt. Governor Steve Pence.^[4]

After a lengthy scandal and investigation during his first term involving alleged abuses of the state's merit-based hiring system, many believed incumbent governor Ernie Fletcher, who sought re-election, no longer had sufficient support from either the Republican Party leadership or voters. It was released from the Courier-Journal newspaper that Anne Northup was praised as a "formidable" candidate by the state's top Republican leader, long-time U.S Senator and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, although McConnell stopped short of an endorsement of any particular candidate. Northup faced Fletcher and businessman Billy Harper in the primary.^[5]

Northup began television advertisements about six weeks before the primary election, with the slogan "The only Republican who can win in November". On May 22, 2007, Northup was defeated in the Republican primary by Fletcher.

2006 campaign

Northup was defeated for re-election to a sixth term in the 2006 congressional election. She lost to Democratic challenger John Yarmuth, former publisher and editorialist of the Louisville Eccentric Observer (LEO), an alternative newsweekly. Although initially considered an underdog for his lack of a political background and the potential for his views to be portrayed as strongly liberal, Yarmuth garnered 122,139 votes (51%) to Northup's 116,157 votes (48%). Third party candidates garnered 2,896 votes (1%).

The campaign was relatively civil, although ads were run calling Yarmuth a hypocrite for his statements condemning the minimum wage as immoral while his family's restaurants paid some employees minimum wage. She also attempted to exploit Yarmuth's lengthy record in print, repeating in campaign ads some of his potentially unpopular statements (such as allegedly supporting the legalization of marijuana) and holding a press conference to complain that not all of his old columns had been made available to her campaign. Major themes of Northup's campaign was that she was independent of the then-unpopular President Bush, and that she was uniquely able to secure federal funds for Louisville projects. Due to her support for many of the President Bush's policies and her past campaigning with the president her reelection was closely watched on election night as an indicator as to how well the Democrats would do in the mid-term elections.

2004 campaign

Northup was elected to a fifth term with 60 percent of the vote in 2004, her largest margin of victory. Her earlier House races were much closer. She defeated long time Jefferson County Circuit Court Clerk Tony Miller. She was able to successfully portray Miller in ads and three debates as uninformed on national issues and unprepared for office.^[6] Northup was endorsed by the Courier-Journal (typically seen as liberal) and former state Attorney General Chris Gorman, a Democrat who ran against her for the seat in 1998.^[7]

2002 campaign

While campaigning for a fourth term in 2002 against Jack Conway, it was revealed that Northup's office had both telephoned and sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission regarding a licensing problem that had previously been dismissed concerning her husband's company. Since the letter referred to a company vice president as a constituent and did not mention that Northup's husband was the president, the Center for Public Integrity called the action a breach of ethics and the Congressional Accountability Project called for an investigation by the House ethics panel. Northup's staff said the letter, which had also asked for updates on the application's progress, did not reveal Northup's ties to the company to avoid the appearance of special consideration. FCC officials acknowledged that the case was reopened on the date of the letter, but said it had done so before the letter arrived. The FCC said Northup's actions had no part in its decision to grant the application four days after receiving the letter.^[8]

2000 Campaign

In 2000, Northup defeated Eleanor Jordan.

References

External links

• Northup Hoover 2007 campaign website
• opensecrets.org profile — campaign funding and other information
• Voting record maintained by the Washington Post
• FEC — contributions to Northup

Preceded by Mike Ward

United States Representative, Kentucky 3rd District 1997–2007

Succeeded by John Yarmuth

Persondata
NAME	Northup, Anne Meagher
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Kentucky politician
DATE OF BIRTH	January 22 1948
PLACE OF BIRTH	Louisville, Kentucky, United States
DATE OF DEATH	living
PLACE OF DEATH

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