Jay Inslee


Jay Robert Inslee is an American politician and attorney who served as the 23rd Governor of Washington from 2013 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served in the United States House of Representatives from 1993 to 1995 and from 1999 to 2012. Inslee was also a candidate in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries.
Born and raised in Seattle, Inslee graduated from the University of Washington and Willamette University College of Law. He served in the Washington House of Representatives from 1989 to 1993. In 1992, Inslee was elected to represent, based around Central Washington, in the U.S. House of Representatives. Defeated for reelection in 1994, Inslee briefly returned to private legal practice. He made his first run for governor of Washington in 1996, coming in fifth in the blanket primary with 10% of the vote. Inslee then served as regional director for the United States Department of Health and Human Services under President Bill Clinton.
Inslee returned to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1999 representing. The new district included Seattle's northern suburbs in King County, Snohomish County, and Kitsap County. He was reelected six times before announcing that he would make another run for the governorship in the 2012 election. He defeated Republican Rob McKenna, the state attorney general, 52% to 48%. Inslee was reelected to a second term in 2016. He was briefly a candidate for the Democratic nomination for the 2020 U.S. presidential election. He was reelected to a third term as governor in 2020. On May 1, 2023, he announced that he would not run for a fourth term.
As governor, Inslee emphasized climate change, education, criminal justice reform, and drug policy reform. He has garnered national attention for his critiques of President Donald Trump. Inslee joined then state attorney general Bob Ferguson and state solicitor general Noah Purcell in suing the first Trump administration over Executive Order 13769, which halted travel for 90 days from seven Muslim-majority countries and imposed a total ban on Syrian refugees entering the United States. The case, Washington v. Trump, led to the order being blocked by the courts, and other executive orders later superseded it.

Early life, education, and legal career

Jay Robert Inslee was born February 9, 1951, in Seattle, Washington, the oldest of three sons of Adele A. and Frank E. Inslee. Inslee is a fifth-generation Washingtonian. Inslee describes his family as being of English and Welsh descent.
Inslee attended Seattle's Ingraham High School, where he was an honor-roll student and star athlete, graduating in 1969. He played center on his high school basketball team and was also the starting quarterback on his football team.
Inslee's interest in environmental issues originated at an early age, with his parents leading groups of high school students on trips cleaning Mount Rainier. He met his future wife, Trudi Tindall, at Ingraham during his sophomore year. Graduating at the height of the Vietnam War, Inslee received student deferments from the draft.
Inslee began college at Stanford University, where he initially intended on studying medicine. After a year, he was forced to drop out because he was unable to get a scholarship. He returned home and, living in his parents' basement, attended the University of Washington. He received a Bachelor of Arts with a major in economics in 1973. He then attended the Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Oregon, receiving a Juris Doctor in 1976.
Inslee and his wife were married on August 27, 1972, and have three sons: Jack, Connor, and Joseph. After Inslee finished law school, they moved to Selah, a suburb of Yakima. Inslee joined the law firm Peters, Schmalz, Leadon & Fowler, working as a city prosecutor. He practiced in Selah for 10 years. He first became politically active in 1985, while advocating for the construction of a new high school. The experience sparked Inslee's interest in politics, emboldening him to run for political office.

Washington House of Representatives (1989–1993)

Elections

Inslee ran for the Washington House of Representatives in 1988 after incumbent Republican State Representative Jim Lewis left office. His opponent, Lynn Carmichael, was the former mayor of Yakima and considered the front-runner in the race. Inslee also struggled to balance his more progressive ideology with the conservative leanings of Central Washington. His campaign attempted to rectify this by emphasizing his rural upbringing and legal experience supporting local average people, farms and businesses. The Washington State Trial Lawyers Association became Inslee's biggest contributor.
When presented with a potential state budget surplus, Inslee called for a tax cut for the middle class, which Carmichael called irresponsible. Inslee claimed Carmichael had supported a sales tax, which she denied. Inslee was an energetic and active campaigner, benefiting from retail politics.
In the blanket primary, Carmichael ranked first with 43% and Inslee ranked second with 40%. Republican Glen Blomgren ranked third with 17%. In the general election, Inslee defeated Carmichael 52%-48%. In 1990, Inslee was reelected with 62% of the vote against Republican Ted Mellotte.

Tenure

In the Washington state legislature, Inslee pursued a bill to provide initial funding to build five branch campuses of the Washington State University system. Although the bill failed, his tenacity made an impression on House Speaker Joe King, who said: "He's not afraid to incur the wrath of the speaker or the caucus." Inslee also focused on preventing steroid usage among high school athletes and pushed for a bill requiring all drivers to carry auto insurance. In 1991, he voted for a bill that required the state to devise a cost-effective energy strategy and state agencies and school districts to pursue and maintain energy-efficient operations.

Committee assignments

Inslee served on the Higher Education and Housing Committees.

Congress (1993–1995)

Elections

;1992
In 1992, six-term incumbent U.S. Representative Sid Morrison chose not to run for reelection representing, instead mounting a campaign for governor. Morrison was a popular moderate Republican incumbent who was considered successful and well-liked in the Democratic-controlled Congress. Despite initially declining to run, Inslee launched a campaign for the open Congressional seat, based in the central-eastern part of the state. His home area of the district, anchored by Yakima, is relatively rural and agriculture-based, while the southeastern part is more focused on research and nuclear waste disposal, anchored by the Tri-Cities. Inslee defeated a favored state senator to win the Democratic primary by 1%. Despite the district's conservative lean, Inslee won the general election in an extremely close race.
;1994
He lost his bid for reelection in the Republican Revolution of 1994 in a rematch against his 1992 opponent, Doc Hastings. Inslee attributed his 1994 defeat in large part to his vote for the Federal Assault Weapons Ban.

Tenure

In Congress, Inslee passed the Yakima River Enhancement Act, a bill long held up in Congress, by brokering a breakthrough with irrigators and wildlife advocates. He also helped to open Japanese markets to American apples and to fund and oversee the nation's biggest nuclear waste site at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation near Richland, Washington.

Committee assignments

  • United States House Committee on Agriculture
  • '''United States House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology'''

    Inter-congressional years (1995–1999)

Inslee moved to Bainbridge Island, a suburb of Seattle, and briefly resumed the practice of law.

1996 gubernatorial election

Inslee ran for governor of Washington in 1996, losing in the blanket primary. Democratic King County Executive and former State Representative Gary Locke ranked first with 23.65% of the vote. Democratic Mayor of Seattle Norm Rice ranked second with 17.5%, but did not qualify for the general election. Republican State Senator Ellen Craswell ranked third with 15.26%, and became the Republican candidate in the general election. Republican State Senator and Senate Majority Leader Dale Foreman ranked fourth with 13.37%. Inslee ranked fifth with 9.75%. No other candidate on the ballot received double digits.
After his failed gubernatorial bid, Inslee was appointed regional director for the United States Department of Health and Human Services by then-President Bill Clinton.

Congress (1999–2012)

Elections

Inslee ran again for Congress in 1998, this time in the 1st congressional district against two-term incumbent Rick White. His campaign attracted national attention when he became the first Democratic candidate to air television ads attacking his opponent and the Republican congressional leadership for the Lewinsky scandal. Inslee won with 49.8% of the vote to White's 44.1%; he had an unintentional assist in his successful return by the conservative third-party candidacy of Bruce Craswell, husband of 1996 GOP gubernatorial nominee Ellen Craswell.
Inslee was reelected six times. In 2000, he defeated State Senate Minority Leader Dan McDonald with 54.6% of the vote. In 2002, Inslee defeated former state representative Joe Marine with 55.6% of the vote after the district was made more Democratic by redistricting. He never faced another contest that close, and was reelected three more times with over 60% of the vote.
In July 2003, after Gary Locke announced he would not seek a third term as Washington's governor, Inslee briefly flirted with a gubernatorial bid before deciding to remain in Congress.
During the 2009-2010 campaign cycle, Inslee raised $1,140,025. In data compiled for the period 2005 to 2007 and excluding individual contributions of less than $200, 64 percent of Inslee's donations were from outside the state of Washington and 86 percent came from outside his district. 43 percent of Inslee's donations came from Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland. The largest interests funding Inslee's campaign were pharmaceutical and health-related companies, lawyers and law firms, and high-tech companies.
In 2010 he won by a 15-point margin, with 57.67% of the votes cast in his favor.