Roy Blunt

Roy Blunt (born January 10, 1950, Niangua, Missouri, U.S.) is an American politician who was elected as a Republican to the U.S. Senate in 2010 and represented Missouri in that body from 2011 to 2023. He previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives (1997–2011), where he was majority whip (2003–07), acting majority leader (2005–06), and minority whip (2007–09).

Blunt’s father was a dairy farmer and a Missouri state representative. Blunt earned degrees in history from Southwest Baptist University (B.A., 1970) and Southwest Missouri State University (M.A., 1972). During that time he married (1967) Roseann Ray, and they later had three children, one of whom, Matt Blunt, served as governor of Missouri (2005–09). The couple divorced in 2003, and later that year Blunt married Abigail Perlman. With his second wife, he adopted a child.

Blunt worked as the clerk and chief election officer for Greene county, Missouri, from 1973 to 1984, when he won election as Missouri secretary of state (1985–93), becoming the first Republican to hold the office in some 40 years. After a failed gubernatorial campaign in 1992, he served as president (1993–96) of Southwest Baptist University before winning election to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1996. After taking office in 1997, Blunt rose quickly through the Republican ranks. He was elected chief deputy whip in 1999, and in 2003 he became majority whip. After Rep. Tom DeLay was indicted in 2005 on charges of conspiring to violate election laws in his home state of Texas, Blunt took over as acting majority leader until the position was filled by Rep. John Boehner in 2006. When Republicans lost their majority in the House after the 2006 elections, Blunt became minority whip. In 2010 Blunt successfully ran for the Senate, and he was sworn in the following year.

Throughout his years in Congress, Blunt adopted a conservative position on most issues. He was a strong proponent of increasing domestic oil production, preserving the Second Amendment’s guarantee of the right to bear arms, and lowering federal income taxes. In 2003 he supported legislation that allowed larger individual tax deductions for charitable giving. He sponsored the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005, which took effect in 2006 and was intended to make it more difficult for methamphetamine producers to buy chemicals and drugs. On immigration Blunt supported the construction of a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border and called for the deployment of more border patrol agents. He also was a vocal opponent of Pres. Barack Obama’s health care reform plan (2010). However, Blunt was also known for working with Democrats on a number of occasions. He notably voted for Pres. Joe Biden’s massive infrastructure bill in 2021.

In 2021 Blunt announced that he would not seek a third term. He left office in 2023.