Louie Gohmert

Louie Gohmert
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas's 1st district
Incumbent
Assumed office January 3, 2005
Preceded by	Max Sandlin
Personal details
Born	(1953-08-18) August 18, 1953 Pittsburg, Texas
Political party	Republican
Spouse	Kathy Gohmert
Children	Katy, Caroline, and Sarah
Residence	Tyler, Texas
Alma mater	Texas A&M University, Baylor University
Occupation	Congressman
Military service
Branch/service	United States Army
Years of service	1978–1982
Unit	Judge Advocate General's Corps

Louis Buller (Louie) Gohmert, Jr. (born August 18, 1953) is an American politician and current Republican U.S. Representative from Texas's 1st congressional district.

Life and career

Gohmert was born in Pittsburg, Texas. He received his B.A. from Texas A&M University in 1975. At A&M, he was a Brigade Commander of the Corps of Cadets. He later received his Juris Doctor from Baylor University in Waco in 1977. Gohmert served in the United States Army Judge Advocate General's Corps, at Fort Benning, Georgia, from 1978 to 1982.

Gohmert was elected as a state district judge for Texas's 7th Judicial District comprising Smith County (Tyler) in 1992 and was reelected two times before being appointed by Governor Rick Perry to fill a vacancy as Chief Justice on Texas's 12th Court of Appeals, where he served from 2002 to 2003. After Texas' 2003 mid-decade redistricting process, he successfully defeated Democratic incumbent 1st District Congressman Max Sandlin for his seat in Congress, becoming the first Republican since Reconstruction to represent the 1st District of northeast Texas. In the Republican primary, Gohmert defeated State Representative Wayne Christian of Center, who thereafter returned to the state legislature.

Gohmert serves on two House committees: Judiciary (because of his judicial background) and Natural Resources (as his district sits on top of the East Texas oil field).

In 2006, Gohmert won his second term by defeating independent Roger L. Owen, a swimming pool builder from Hallsville. He faced no major-party opposition in 2008.

Congressional activities

2008-2009

He offered an alternative plan to kick-start the economy with his tax holiday bill that would allow taxpayers to be exempt for two months from having federal income tax taken out of their paychecks.

On July 29, 2009, Gohmert signed on as a co-sponsor of H.R. 1503. This bill would "amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to require the principal campaign committee of a candidate for election to the office of president to include with the committee's statement of organization a copy of the candidate's birth certificate, together with such other documentation as may be necessary to establish that the candidate meets the qualifications for eligibility to the office of president under the Constitution".

Controversies

"Terror babies"

On August 12, 2010, Gohmert appeared on Anderson Cooper 360° to defend recent comments he made on the floor of the House regarding "terror babies". Initially, Gohmert had claimed (in a speech made on the House floor in June 2010) that an ex-FBI agent had told him about "terror baby" plots. On Fox Business News, Gohmert had later claimed that an airline passenger with a relative in Hamas had a grandchild who was to be intentionally born in the United States. In the interview, Gohmert asserted that pregnant women from the Middle East are traveling to the US on tourist visas, planning to deliver the child there. According to the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, this automatically grants citizenship to the child. Gohmert asserted that the child would then be returned to the mother's home country and be submitted to a life of terrorist training. When repeatedly asked by the host for any evidence of this, Gohmert did not provide substantiation for either the ex-FBI agent story or the airline passenger story, but gave a description of a Washington Post article, which described so-called "birth tourism" packages, mainly directed at Chinese tourists. These packages, (one was described in the article for $14,750), were described by Gohmert as a "gaping hole in the security of our country". When asked several times by Cooper for the connection and any corroborating evidence, Gohmert responded "If you don't think this is evidence, you have to believe that the terrorists are more stupid than these enterprising people". The Daily Show later parodied this incident.

"College Arts Director Firing Incident"

On October 27, 2010 former Arts Gallery Director Christian Cutler at Stephen F. Austin University appeared on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 to share his story about a recent run-in with Congressman Gohmert. Cutler claimed that in August 2010, someone from Congressman Gohmert’s staff called and asked him to judge an art competition about one and a half hours off campus in Tyler, Texas. Cutler stated he would love to do it. When Gohmert’s staff called back in September to follow up, Cutler says he told the staffer that he felt the Congressman was a “sensationalist” and a “fear monger” because since the last time he talked to Gohmert’s staff, he saw the Congressman’s appearance on Anderson Cooper 360 in which Gohmert talked about the existence of “terror babies” as a threat to national security.

On September 20, 2010 Cutler received a letter from the Congressman Gohmert, who had also CC’d the President of the university, stating “May God Grant you peace that passes all understanding so that one day your bitterness and intolerance diminishes to the point that you are able to tolerate even someone like me.” The letter also stated that Gohmert believed the competition was to be held at Stephen F. Austin University, not in Tyler, and that he would now have to find a different venue for the competition. Following the email, there was a string of correspondence between Cutler and his supervisors at the university. On September 28, Cutler was called into the Dean’s office and asked to resign, which he did.

Gohmert maintains that he did not want to get Cutler fired at all. "I did not ask nor desire that the Director of Art Galleries be dismissed and am not aware of all of the reasons for his dismissal," he said in a statement. "I did not know he would be fired, did not seek it, and do not know all of the reasons for it. If the things he is misrepresenting now are any indication of past performance, then his actions in this incident may have been the least of his employment problems." In the days following Gohmert’s email, two of Cutler’s supervisors called the incident the “last straw,” indicating that there might have already been some previous concerns over Cutler’s job performance. However, Cutler claims there was no tension between him and the university at all and that he received stellar job performance reports.

Implication that Obama is complicit in helping international Islamic "caliphate"

Rep. Gohmert, speaking on the House floor on June 16, 2011, stated: ‘’... I know the president made the mistake one day of saying he had visited all 57 states, and I'm well aware that there are not 57 states in this country. Although there are 57 members of OIC, the Islamic states in the world. Perhaps there was some confusion whether he had been to all the 57 Islamic states, as opposed to all 50 U.S. states. But, nonetheless, we have an obligation to the 50 American states, not the 57 Muslim, Islamic states. Our oath we took is in this body, in this House. And it's to the people of America. And it's not to the Muslim Brotherhood, who may very well take over Egypt and once they do, they are bent upon setting up a caliphate around the world, including the United States. And this administration will been [sic] complicit in helping people who wants [sic] to destroy our country’’. This quote has been repeatedly removed from this Wikipedia article in spite of the fact that it attracted national attention.

Comment on President Obama's September 8, 2011, jobs speech

Instead of offering a comment on the substance of President Obama's jobs speech, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) told reporters he was mesmerized by Obama's teleprompter skill. "It is a head dance, just a beautiful thing," Gohmert said, moving his head from side to side. "Back and forth, three to five seconds between the teleprompters. ... He is so good. I mean I don't need sound, I can just sit there and admire how good he is at going back and forth between those two teleprompters."

Congressional committee assignments

Committee on the Judiciary

• Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties
• Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security
• Task Force on Judicial Impeachment

Committee on Natural Resources

• Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources
• Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands

In addition Gohmert is a member of the Republican Study Committee and the Tea Party Caucus.

Caucus memberships

• Israel Allies Caucus
• International Conservation Caucus
• Tea Party Caucus

External links

• Official congressional website
• Official campaign website
• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Financial information (federal office) at the Federal Election Commission
• Profile at Vote Smart
• Profile at SourceWatch

Articles

• "Nine New Veterans Join Congress", Veterans of Foreign Wars Magazine
• Video of Gohmert Criticizing Rep. John Murtha
• Video of Gohmert Blaming Stock Market Failures on Democrats and Murtha