Jeff Flake


Jeffry Lane Flake is an American retired politician and former diplomat who served as a United States senator from Arizona from 2013 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served in the United States House of Representatives from 2001 to 2013 and later as the U.S. ambassador to Turkey from 2022 to 2024.
Born in Snowflake, Arizona, Flake attended Brigham Young University, from which he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in international relations, and later his Master of Arts degree in political science. In the early 1980s, he became a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in South Africa, where he learned to speak Afrikaans. After returning to the United States, Flake served as executive director of the Goldwater Institute, before being elected as a Republican to the House of Representatives from Arizona's 1st congressional district in 2001. He served as the representative for the 1st district until renumbering following the 2000 census redefined the district to be Arizona's 6th congressional district, which he then represented until he entered the Senate in 2013.
Flake sought the Republican nomination for the 2012 Senate election after incumbent Jon Kyl announced his retirement. He defeated Democratic candidate and former United States Surgeon General Richard Carmona in the general election. Flake was one of the bipartisan "Gang of Eight" U.S. senators who pushed an immigration reform bill through the Senate in 2013. He is known as a vocal critic of President Donald Trump, but generally voted in line with Trump's positions. On October 24, 2017, Flake announced that he would not seek re-election in 2018.
Throughout his Senate career, Flake suffered from consistently low approval ratings. In April 2013, less than three months after taking office, he had 32% approval and 51% disapproval ratings. By mid-2017, he dropped to 18% approval and 62% disapproval ratings, but recovered slightly near the end of his term, with 30% approval and 51% disapproval ratings as of July 2018.
On January 29, 2019, Flake was hired by CBS as a contributor for CBS News. He was nominated by Democratic president Joe Biden as ambassador to Turkey and confirmed by the Senate on October 26, 2021. He presented his credentials to Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the Presidential Complex of Turkey in Ankara on January 26, 2022.

Early life, education, and early career

Jeffry Lane Flake was born in Snowflake, Arizona, the son of Nerita and Dean Maeser Flake. His birth town was named in part for his great-great-grandfather, Mormon pioneer William J. Flake. Flake obtained a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and a Master of Arts in political science from Brigham Young University. He took a two-year leave of absence to serve as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in South Africa and Zimbabwe in the early 1980s. He speaks Afrikaans. He worked in the public affairs sector after college and was the executive director of the Foundation for Democracy in Namibia and executive director of the Goldwater Institute before entering the House of Representatives. He opposed economic sanctions on South Africa in the 1980s, arguing that sanctions would harm the black population who were already suffering under apartheid policies.

Political career

U.S. House of Representatives (2001–2013)

Elections

Flake was first elected to Congress in 2000 from what was then the 1st District, after Republican incumbent Matt Salmon stepped down to honor a self-imposed term limit. The district, which included most of the East Valley, was then renumbered as the 6th district as Arizona gained two Congressional seats because of the results of the 2000 census. Flake easily defeated his primary challenger.
In his campaign in 2000, Flake had pledged to serve no more than three terms in Congress which would see him serve no later than January 2007. Shortly after being elected for a third time, Flake announced in early 2005 that he had changed his mind on pledging term limits and was planning to run for reelection in 2006. "It was a mistake to limit my own terms," Flake said.
In that same election, three out of five mayors in his home district opposed his reelection because, according to Flake, he did not "bring pork barrel spending" to the mayors' cities. In 2006, several Democrats had announced their intention to run for the seat but only one met the June filing deadline, and that particular filing was rejected due to an insufficient number of nominating signatures. "I did expect to have a primary opponent. I deserve one," Flake said, referring to the term-limit pledge which he had broken. "By all rights, I ought to have an opponent. I just got lucky, I guess."
In the 2006 midterm elections, Flake had no Democratic Party opponent and easily defeated the Libertarian Party candidate, Jason Blair, with 74% of the vote.

Tenure

Flake was a member of the Republican Liberty Caucus, a group of libertarian-leaning Republican congressmen. He was also a member of the Republican Study Committee.

Committee assignments

2012 election

In February 2011, Flake announced that he was running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by the retiring Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl in 2012. Flake easily won the Republican nomination against real estate businessman Wil Cardon. He faced former United States' surgeon general Richard Carmona, who sought office for the first time in the general election. In May 2012, Flake led Carmona by 13 points in the polls. In an October 2012 poll by Public Policy Polling, Flake was trailing Carmona by two points. After the race tightened, the Wall Street Journal criticized a controversial Flake ad that accused Carmona of having "issues with anger, with ethics, and with women." Flake was endorsed by the Casa Grande Dispatch, the United States Chamber of Commerce, the Senate Conservatives Fund, and the Club for Growth.
Flake defeated Democrat Richard Carmona 49–46% on November 6, 2012. He won mainly on the strength of carrying Maricopa County, home to Phoenix and 60 percent of the state's population, by 77,200 votes, more than the overall margin of 67,900 votes. He also benefited from Mitt Romney, whom Flake considers a friend, carrying the state by 10 points in the presidential election.

Tenure

Flake succeeded retiring Republican U.S. Senator Jon Kyl on January 3, 2013.
Flake used his experience surviving in the wild for six days with a Democratic Senator to develop an idea to end partisan gridlock in Washington. In 2014, Flake and U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich were featured on a Discovery Channel reality TV show, Rival Survival, where the two stayed on a small Micronesian island for six days. Flake later joked during a speech at the National Press Club that sending both Senate leaders to a remote island together might reduce partisanship and allow more legislation to move forward.
Flake was on the field during practice for the annual Congressional Baseball Game when the Congressional baseball shooting happened on June 14, 2017. He said the attendees were like "sitting ducks" and that it was likely that the Capitol Police saved their lives:
All of a sudden, we heard a very loud shot. Everybody thought 'sounds like a gun'. The gunman was over by the third base dugout, with a clear view of the field and everybody on it. A lot of us dove into the dugout and tried to get as many as we could, but at that point, there was firing behind us from the security detail, the Capitol Police, and I started yelling back, 'are you friendly?'—making sure that it was our guy, because we didn't know if there were other shooters that had us surrounded, and were coming into the dugout.

Former President Obama called Flake that morning to extend his best wishes and prayers for the victims. Flake had flown with Obama from Washington, D.C., to Arizona in 2011 after the shooting of then-Congresswoman Gabby Giffords.
On October 24, 2017, Flake announced in a speech that he would not seek a second term in the Senate. Flake's speech, which was described by McKay Coppins as a "thundering indictment of his party, his president, and his country's political culture," was called "the most important speech of 2017" by Chris Cillizza.
In May 2018, Flake stated that he would donate to Democratic Senator Joe Manchin's campaign if Don Blankenship won the West Virginia Republican Senate primary. Blankenship was defeated by Patrick Morrisey.

Committee assignments

After Joe Biden was elected president in 2020, Flake was seen as a contender for a job as an ambassador in Biden's administration, along with several other moderate Republicans who were close with Biden.
In June 2021, it was reported that Biden was set to offer Flake a position as the United States ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa. Flake reportedly denied the rumor.
Flake was officially nominated by Biden to be the United States Ambassador to Turkey on July 13, 2021. On September 28, 2021, a hearing on his nomination was held before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. On October 19, 2021, his nomination was reported favorably out of committee. On October 26, 2021, Flake was confirmed by the Senate by voice vote. Flake was sworn in on December 10, 2021. He resigned in September 2024.