page_title: Richard Shelby
section_title: 2010s
hierarchical_section_title: Richard Shelby / U.S. Senate / Tenure / 2010s
caption_attribution_description: English: Supreme Court Nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh and Senator Richard Shelby
context_page_description: Richard Craig Shelby is an American politician serving as the senior United States Senator from Alabama. First elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986, he is the Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, succeeding Thad Cochran. He previously served as Chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and Senate Committee on Rules and Administration. He is the longest serving U.S. Senator from Alabama, having surpassed John Sparkman's previous record in March 2019.
  Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Shelby received his law degree from the Birmingham School of Law in 1961. After law school in 1963, he went on to serve as city prosecutor. During this period he worked as a U.S. Magistrate for the Northern District of Alabama and Special Assistant Attorney General of Alabama. He won a seat in the Alabama Senate in 1970. In 1978, he was elected from the 7th District to the United States House of Representatives, where he was among a group of Conservative Democrats known as the boll weevils.
  In 1986, Shelby won a tight race as a Democrat for the U.S. Senate.
context_section_description: Shelby's high campaign contribution spending has been criticized; from 2008 until 2014 he had reimbursed himself and his wife more than $500,000 from his campaign and leadership PACs. The Wall Street Journal called him a "stingy lawmaker".
  In May 2011, Shelby was one of five Republicans to vote against a Republican bill expanding offshore oil and gas drilling in U.S. coastal waters and requiring the Interior Department to complete multiple offshore lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coasts of Virginia and Alaska.
  In March 2015, Shelby announced the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee would "review proposals aimed at providing greater clarity in Fed decision-making and at reforming the composition of Federal Reserve System" and that he had asked for input from the original regional reserve bank presidents for the Federal Reserve.
  In March 2017, Shelby referred to Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch as "an outstanding nominee" who Republicans should make sure if Democrats wanted to filibuster and said he was not worried about the changes to the filibuster rules affecting the Senate, citing the Democrats as having used "nuclear option" first.
  In December 2017, after Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley issued a statement requesting that the nomination of Brett Talley for federal judge in Alabama be withdrawn, a spokesman for Shelby stated that Shelby considered Talley "a great young attorney" and had spoken with him the previous week while asking "for his letter of withdrawal in hopes that Mr. Talley can gain more experience."
  In August 2018, after Rand Paul proposed an amendment to tie a spending bill to the funding of Planned Parenthood, Shelby warned that the amendment could attract supporters while concurrently becoming a spoiler for a larger government spending bill.
  In September 2018, Shelby reported that the House and Senate were close to a deal on a third package of spending bills for 2019. Representative Nita Lowey disputed the claim, saying that she did not believe a deal would be reached until after the House adjourned and a Republican aide in the House of Representatives responded that there was no time to complete the package.
  In November 2018, Shelby, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and John Thune met with President Trump at the White House, Shelby stating after the meeting that he told Trump the Republicans should avoid a partial government shutdown over Trump's wishes for a border wall and that he was unsure of Trump's position having been affected by his comments.
  In February 2019, after President Trump delivered the 2019 State of the Union Address, Shelby stated that the address was a reiterating of the president's support for the U.S.-Mexico border wall and confirmed an interaction with House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Nita Lowey, a leading Democratic negotiator.
caption: Shelby and Brett Kavanaugh in July 2018
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