Chris Van Hollen
Christopher Van Hollen Jr. is an American attorney and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Maryland, a seat he has held since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. representative for Maryland's 8th congressional district from 2003 to 2017 and as a Maryland state senator from 1995 to 2003.
In 2007, Van Hollen became the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. In this post, he was responsible for leading efforts to defend vulnerable Democrats and get more Democrats elected to Congress in 2008, which led to a wave election for Democrats. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi created a new leadership post, Assistant to the Speaker, in 2006 so that Van Hollen could be present at all leadership meetings. He was elected ranking member on the Budget Committee on November 17, 2010. Pelosi appointed Van Hollen to the 12-member bipartisan Committee on Deficit Reduction with a mandate for finding major budget reductions by late 2011. On October 17, 2013, Pelosi appointed Van Hollen to serve on the bicameral conference committee.
Van Hollen ran for the United States Senate in 2016 to replace retiring Senator Barbara Mikulski. He defeated U.S. Representative Donna Edwards in the Democratic primary and won the general election with 61% of the vote to Republican nominee Kathy Szeliga's 36%. He was reelected in 2022 with nearly 66% of the vote to Republican nominee Chris Chaffee's 34%. Van Hollen chaired the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee from 2017 to 2019. Van Hollen became Maryland's senior senator when Ben Cardin retired from the Senate in 2025. Van Hollen is set to become the dean of Maryland's congressional delegation in 2027 with long-time Representative Steny Hoyer announcing his retirement in early 2026.
Early life, education, and career
Van Hollen was born in Karachi, Pakistan, the eldest of three children of American parents, Edith Eliza and Christopher Van Hollen. His father was a Foreign Service officer who served as deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs and U.S. ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives ; his mother worked in the Central Intelligence Agency and the State Department, where she served as chief of the intelligence bureau for South Asia. He spent parts of his early life in Pakistan, Turkey, India, and Sri Lanka. He returned to the United States for his junior year of high school, and attended Middlesex School in Concord, Massachusetts, where his grandfather had once taught.He is an alumnus of the Kodaikanal International School. In 1982, Van Hollen graduated from Swarthmore College with a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy. He continued his studies at Harvard University, where he earned a Master of Public Policy concentrating in national security studies from the John F. Kennedy School of Government in 1985. He then earned a Juris Doctor from the Georgetown University Law Center in 1990.
Early political career
Van Hollen worked as a legislative assistant for defense and foreign policy to U.S. Senator Charles Mathias, a Republican from Maryland, from 1985 to 1987. He was also a staff member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and a legislative advisor for federal affairs to Maryland governor William Donald Schaefer. He was admitted to the Maryland bar in 1990, and joined the law firm of Arent Fox.Maryland State Legislature (1991–2003)
Van Hollen served in the Maryland General Assembly from 1991 to 2003, first in the House of Delegates and then in the State Senate. In the Senate, he served on the Budget and Taxation Committee and the Health and Human Services Subcommittee. He led successful efforts to raise the tobacco tax, prohibit oil drilling in the Chesapeake Bay, mandate trigger locks for guns, and increase funding for education and healthcare. In 2002, The Washington Post called Van Hollen "one of the most accomplished members of the General Assembly."U.S. House of Representatives (2003–2017)
Elections
Before Van Hollen's election, incumbent Connie Morella had won eight elections in the district, despite being a Republican in a district that had swung heavily Democratic. Morella's success was largely attributed to her political independence and relatively liberal voting record, including support for abortion rights, gay rights, gun control, and increased environmental protections.After Morella's reelection in 2000, Democratic Maryland Senate President Thomas V. Miller, Jr. made no secret that he wanted to draw the 8th out from under Morella. Indeed, one redistricting plan after the 2000 census divided the 8th in two, giving one district to Van Hollen and forcing Morella to run against popular State Delegate Mark Kennedy Shriver. The final plan was far less ambitious, but made the district even more Democratic than its predecessor. It absorbed nine heavily Democratic precincts from neighboring Prince George's County, an area Morella had never represented. It also restored a heavily Democratic spur in eastern Montgomery County that had been cut out in the last round of redistricting. Van Hollen defeated Morella in the 2002 general election in part, according to some analysts, because of this redistricting.
In 2002, Van Hollen entered a competitive Democratic primary against Shriver and former Clinton administration aide Ira Shapiro. Though Shriver had the most money, Van Hollen launched a grassroots effort that mobilized Democratic voters. After receiving the endorsement of The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, and other local papers, Van Hollen defeated Shriver, 43.5% to 40.6%.
During the campaign, Van Hollen emphasized that even when Morella voted with the district, her partisan affiliation kept Tom DeLay and the rest of her party's more conservative leadership in power. Van Hollen also touted his leadership in the State Senate on issues such as education funding, HMO reform, trigger locks for handguns, and protecting the Chesapeake Bay from oil drilling. Van Hollen defeated Morella, 51.7% to 48.2%. He crushed Morella in Prince George's County while narrowly winning Montgomery County. Morella won most of the precincts she had previously represented.
Van Hollen never faced another contest nearly that close, and was reelected six times with at least 60% of the vote. After the 2010 census, his district was made slightly less Democratic. He lost a heavily Democratic spur of Montgomery County to the neighboring 6th district, and lost his share of Prince George's County to the 4th district. In their place, the 8th absorbed a strongly Republican spur of Frederick County, as well as the southern part of even more Republican Carroll County. Nonetheless, his share of Montgomery County has more than double the population of his shares of Carroll and Frederick Counties combined, and Van Hollen won a sixth term over Republican Ken Timmerman with 63% of the vote. He lost in Carroll and Frederick, but swamped Timmerman in Montgomery by 130,406 votes.
Tenure
In 2003, the Committee for Education Funding, a nonpartisan education coalition founded in 1969, named Van Hollen its Outstanding New Member of the Year. The first bill Van Hollen introduces every session is the Keep Our Promise to America's Children and Teachers Act, which would fully fund No Child Left Behind and Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. He introduced an amendment, which passed, that repealed a 9.5 percent loophole in student loans that had allowed lenders to pocket billions of taxpayer dollars. Now, that money is available for additional student loans.Because many federal employees live in his district, Van Hollen has worked on a number of issues relating to them. He supported pay parity in pay raises for civilian employees and introduced an amendment, which passed, to block attempts to outsource federal jobs.
Van Hollen has secured federal funding for a number of local-interest projects, including transportation initiatives, local homeland security efforts, education programs and community development projects. Van Hollen included a provision in legislation governing Washington Metro to prevent housing development in Takoma Park. He and Adam Schiff often discuss issues of National Security on the floor of the House in tandem, with particular commentary on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In May 2006, Van Hollen formed a congressional caucus on the Netherlands with Dutch-born Republican U.S. Representative Pete Hoekstra from Michigan. The goal of the caucus is to promote the U.S. relationship with the Netherlands and remember the Dutch role in establishing the State of New York and the United States.
Image:Chris Van Hollen DNC 2008.jpg|240px|thumb|right|Van Hollen speaking during the second day of the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado, in his capacity as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. He is flanked by Democratic House challengers.
In July 2006, Van Hollen urged the Bush administration to support a ceasefire supported by a peacekeeping force that would end the 2006 Lebanon War. He was criticized by elements of the Jewish and pro-Israel community, a large part of his constituency, for criticizing U.S. and Israeli policy in the Lebanon conflict. In follow-up comments, Van Hollen indicated that his original comments were meant as a critique of Bush administration policy but did not retract his position, and other members of the local Jewish and pro-Israel community defended him.
In 2006, Van Hollen opted out of the race to succeed the retiring Senator Paul Sarbanes, saying he would rather spend time with his family and help elect more Democrats to Congress. In keeping with that, Van Hollen was appointed to Chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
In 2009, Van Hollen introduced a bill which establishes a green bank to catalyze the financing of renewable energy and energy efficiency projects. He reintroduced the same bill again in 2014.
In March 2010, when Charles Rangel was forced to resign as Chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means over ethics charges, Van Hollen played a key role in having Sander Levin succeed to the Chairmanship over Pete Stark. Stark was the second-most experienced member of the committee while Levin was third, and party tradition would have made Stark chairman due to seniority. However, Van Hollen and other younger members saw Stark's past intemperate comments as a liability to the Democrats in an election year.
On April 29, 2010, Van Hollen introduced the campaign finance DISCLOSE Act. He reintroduced the bill for the 113th Congress on February 9, 2012.
In April 2011, Van Hollen sued the Federal Election Commission, charging it with regulatory capture and the creation of a loophole that allowed unlimited and undisclosed financing in the 2010 election season. According to Van Hollen, had it not been for the loophole, "much of the more than $135 million in secret contributions that funded expenditures would have been disclosed."
During the 2012 Obama reelection campaign, Van Hollen participated in one-on-one debate prep with vice president Joe Biden, impersonating the Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan.
In 2014, Van Hollen worked with a bipartisan group to pass the ABLE Act. The legislation allowed people with disabilities to create tax-free savings accounts for qualified disability-related expenses. The act was signed into law on December 19, 2014.