Life and Career

Born on September 12, 1956 in Parker, Kansas to Nancy and Robert Brownback, Sam was raised on a farm in Garnett, Kansas, where his parents still reside. As a young man, Brownback was state president of the youth group Future Farmers of America and eventually went on to become the national vice president from 1976 to 1977. Brownbacl attended Kansas State University where he was elected student body president and was a member of Alpha Gamma Rho. He went on to receive his J.D. from the University of Kansas in 1982. For a year after college Brownback hosted a weekly, half-hour radio show, before becoming an attorney in Manhattan, Kansas and later a Kansas secretary of agriculture in 1986. Four years later, Brownback was accepted to the White House Fellow program (a high level government-citizen ambassador program) and was detailed to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative from 1990-91. Brownback returned to Kansas to resume his position as secretary of agriculture until 1993. In 1994, Sam was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and in 1996 ran in the special Senatorial election to replace Bob Dole who had resigned his seat in order to face off with Clinton for the White House.

Brownback joined the 1996 Republican Senate race and defeated Senator Sheila Frahm who had been appointed to fill Dole's seat. Brownback was reelected to the US Senate and remains in the position today.

Brownback is married to the former Mary Stauffer, whose family owned a successful media company until 1995. They have five children.

Raised as a Methodist, Brownback later joined a nondenominational evangelical church, and in 2002 he converted to Catholicism. He joined the Catholic Church through Opus Dei priest Father C. John McCloskey in Washington DC. Brownback himself, however, is not a member of the Opus Dei organization.

In the Senate

In the Senate, Brownback is a member of the Judiciary Committee, the Appropriations Committee (chaired the Subcommittee on District of Columbia when the Republicans were in the majority), the Joint Economic Committee, and the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. In 2000, Brownback and Congressman Chris Smith pushed through the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), which President Clinton signed.

Brownback's views are summed up as follows: opposed to abortion, wants limited power of federal courts rule on church/state issues (co-sponsor of the Constitution Restoration Act and chairs the Senate Values Action Team, an off-the-record weekly meeting of representatives from religious conservative organizations), strongly supports the traditional marriage movement, is against same-sex marriage, one of the three Republican candidates for president who admitted to not believing in evolution, believes there is no Constitutional right to privacy, opposed Bush's troop surge in Iraq as well as the Democratic Party's timed withdrawal, opposes the restoration of habeas corpus rights revoked by the Military Commissions Act of 2006, supports spinal cord stem cell research but not embryonic, supports intervening in Darfur's genocide short of military engagement, wants stronger borders, thinks the U.S. should apologize for past mistreatment of Native Americans (Senate Joint Resolution 37), and supports a flat tax.

2008 Presidential Nomination

In December 2006 Brownback defined himself as "an economic, a fiscal, a social and a compassionate conservative." (Source: Forbes) A year later, he announced in Topeka, Kansas his candidacy for the Republican nomination for president in 2008. In February 2007, a poll by Rasmussen Reports held that 3% of likely GOP primary voters would support Brownback. (Source: Yahoo! News)

Brownback pulled out of the race for the Republican Presidential Nomination on 19 October 2007, after his campaign that was built on principles of social conservatism failed to gain public support. His poll numbers could not climb above 3% of Republicans, and he stood in the shadow of Mike Huckabee, another social conservative, who outshined his oratory skills. He struggled financially as well, raising under $1 million in his entire presidential bid. (Source: NY Times).