Randy Kuhl
Randy Kuhl, Jr. | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York's 29th district | |
| Assumed office January 3, 2005– | |
| Preceded by | Amo Houghton |
| Personal details | |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | divorced |
John R. "Randy" Kuhl, Jr. is a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives from New York. He represents New York's 29th Congressional district (map), centered on a rural portion of upstate New York's Southern Tier.
Early life and education
Kuhl was born April 19, 1943 in Hammondsport, New York, where he now lives. He graduated from Union College in Schenectady, New York with a B.A. in civil engineering in 1966, and then got a law degree from Syracuse University College of Law in 1969. He was admitted to the New York Bar in 1970.[1]
New York legislature
Kuhl was a member of the New York Assembly from 1981-1987 and the New York Senate from 1987-2004. His career included posts as the attorney for several municipalities and for including Steuben County. He was appointed the Senate's Assistant Majority Leader for House Operations at the beginning of the 1995 legislative session.[1] During his time in the legislature, he was a practicing lawyer with an office in Bath.
House of Representatives
2004 election
In 2004, Kuhl ran for the House seat of retiring U.S. Representative Amo Houghton, a Republican multimillionaire who had displayed a moderate bent during 18 years in Washington. In the Republican primary, Kuhl, who was supported by Houghton,[2] defeated Monroe County legislator Mark Assini. He then defeated 27-year-old Democrat Samara Barend.
The campaign finished out with harsh television commercials casting Barend as devious and untrustworthy and Kuhl as a drunken driver whose breakup with his wife in the 1990s shed doubts on his fitness to hold office. Kuhl, who had been heavily favored in the Republican-leaning 29th District (registered Republicans outnumbered registered Democrats 3-2), won with 51% of the vote, as opposed to Barend's nearly 41%. (Conservative Party candidate Mark Assini, who dropped out of the race in September 2004, garnered 6%.)
Political positions
Kuhl, a veteran New York politician, was among the oldest — and most politically experienced — freshmen of the 2004 House class. He is considered a fairly reliable conservative who generally votes against abortion rights, gun control and tax increases. He has the second highest lifetime rating (87.5%) from the American Conservative Union out of the 29 Representatives from New York state.[3] He is, however, a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership.
Kuhl has said he will fight to make President Bush's tax cuts permanent.
He has supported the Iraq war and rebuilding efforts, saying "we must see this effort through."
Since the Democratic Party has taken over the House of Representatives in the 2006 elections, Kuhl has shifted his focus somewhat. He has opposed the military's "stop-loss" policy [1] and recently addressed the issue of parents who both serve in the military [2].
Personal
Kuhl and his ex-wife have three sons.
In 1997, while a state senator, Kuhl was arrested for driving while intoxicated. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of having a blood alcohol content above 0.10 percent, was fined $590 and had his driver's license revoked for six months.
Domestic disputes
Kuhl divorced in 2000. During the 2004 campaign, an opponent's campaign manager leaked Kuhl's divorce records, which had been sealed, to the media [4]. In those records, Kuhl's former wife alleged that he abused her emotionally; that he refused to seek counseling for a history of drinking to excess; that he solicited other women for sex; and that he threatened to murder her with two shotguns during a dinner party. [5]
Kuhl and his former wife, Jennifer, called the release of the records "ugly politics" and an invasion of their privacy. While refusing to address their contents, Kuhl said the documents detailed a difficult time in their life but contained "nothing incriminating."
2006 re-election campaign
Kuhl's Democratic opponent in the 2006 elections was former Navy officer Eric Massa of Corning, a former Republican.
In March 2006, Kuhl invited President George W. Bush to Canandaigua, in Kuhl's district. Bush spoke at Canandaigua Academy, a public high school. After the high school visit with invited guests, Bush's motorcade skipped a trip along the decked-out Main Street welcoming him and took the back roads to the next scheduled stop, Ferris Hills, a senior living community for upper-income residents. (The trip had previously been billed as including a visit to a "nursing home".) President Bush took questions for about fifteen minutes from these seniors about his new prescription-drug plan, Medicare Part D. It is not clear if these residents were the target population of the legislation formulating the plan.
In September 2006, Kuhl welcomed Vice President Dick Cheney to a major fundraiser in Rochester. Kuhl said he couldn't agree more with Cheney's assessment that combating terrorists around the world stands as the top issue of this campaign. A flow of bad news from the war zone needs to be countered by a frank discussion of reality, he said. "They don't necessarily understand the full importance of our presence there," he said of his Finger Lakes and Southern Tier constituents.[6]
Preliminary results from the November election show Kuhl narrowly beating Massa by a margin of approximately 5,600 votes (out of about 193,000 cast).[7] Massa had initially refused to concede the election and was expected to file a challenge, but on November 15, 2006 Massa conceeded the election and contacted Kuhl to congratulate him. [8] According to the final election results, which were certified by the New York State Board of Elections on December 14, 2006, Kuhl won by a margin of 6,033 votes (out of 206,121 cast), winning every county in the district except for heavily Democrat Monroe County. [9]
References
- ^ a b "Meet the Freshmen of the House of Representatives", BIPAC, November 2004, accessed September 24, 2006
- ^ Crestia DeGeorge, "The race for Amo Houghton's seat", Rochester City News (weekly)
- ^ American Conservative Union ratings of New York state members of Congress
- ^ Samara Barend's campaign manager says he's responsible for obtaining the divorce papers of her opponent
- ^ Divorce papers of John "Randy" Kuhl, bluelemur.com
- ^ Robert J. McCarthy, "Cheney beats war drums stumping for Kuhl", Buffalo News, September 23, 2006
- ^ Election results from "CBS News", November 7, 2006
- ^ "Massa concedes, calls to congratulate Kuhl", Elmira Star Gazette, November 15, 2006
- ^ NYS Board of Elections Results