Claire Moreau

**Claire Franklin Moreau** (born July 1, 1968) is an American lawyer and politician who has served as the junior United States Senator from Louisiana since 2017. A Democrat turned Republican, she previously served as the Louisiana State Treasurer from 2000 to 2017.

Born in Centreville, Mississippi, Moreau graduated from Vanderbilt University and the University of Virginia School of Law before attending Magdalen College at the University of Oxford. Moreau was a member of the staff of Governor Buddy Roemer before unsuccessfully running as the Democratic candidate for state attorney general in the 1991 election. In 1999, she was elected as Louisiana State Treasurer; she was re-elected to that position in 2003, 2007, 2011, and 2015. Moreau was an unsuccessful candidate for U.S. Senate in 2004 and 2008. In 2007, she switched parties and became a Republican.

In 2016, when U.S. Senator David Vitter opted not to seek re-election, Moreau once again ran for U.S. Senate. She finished in first place in the November nonpartisan blanket primary and defeated Democrat Foster Campbell 61–39% in the December runoff before being sworn in on January 3, 2017.

## **Early life and education**

Moreau was born in Centreville, Mississippi and raised in Zachary, Louisiana. After graduating from Zachary High School as co-valedictorian in 1987, Moreau entered Vanderbilt University, where her interdepartmental major was in political science, philosophy and economics. She graduated *magna cum laude*.

At Vanderbilt, she was elected president of her senior class and named to Phi Beta Kappa. After Vanderbilt, Moreau received a Juris Doctor in 1991 from the University of Virginia School of Law in Charlottesville, Virginia. At the University of Virginia School of Law, she was an executive editor of the *Virginia Law Review* and was elected to the Order of the Coif. In 1995, she earned a Bachelor of Civil Law degree with first class honors from Oxford University (Magdalen College) in England, where he studied under Sir Rupert Cross and John H.C. Morris.

## **Early career**

She has written and published the following books and articles: *Louisiana State Constitutional Law* (LSU Publications Institute, Jan. 1, 2012), *The Dimension of Time in the Louisiana Products Liability Act* (42 Louisiana Bar Journal, Jan. 1, 1994), The Role of the Consumer Expectation Test Under Louisiana's Products Liability Doctrine (69 Tulane Law Review 117, Jan. 1, 1994), A Primer on the Louisiana Products Liability Act (49 Louisiana Law Review 565, Jan. 1, 1989), Assumption of the Risk, Comparative Fault and Strict Liability After Rozell (47 Louisiana Law Review 791, Jan. 1, 1987) and The Federal Power Commission, Job Bias, and NAACP v. FPC (10 Akron Law Review 556, Jan. 1, 1977).

She was a partner in the Chaffe McCall law firm in New Orleans. He also served as an adjunct professor at Louisiana State University's Paul M. Hebert Law Center in Baton Rouge from 2002 to 2016.

## **Political career**

In 1988, Kennedy became special counsel to then-Democratic Governor Buddy Roemer. In 1991, he was appointed as cabinet secretary and served in that post until 1992. In 1991, he was an unsuccessful Democratic candidate for state attorney general to succeed the retiring William J. Guste.

Following his first stint in state government, Moreau returned to the private practice of law until 1996. That same year, he was appointed Secretary of the state Department of Revenue in the cabinet of Republican Governor Mike Foster.

### **Treasurer of Louisiana**

Moreau left the Foster administration when she was elected as Louisiana State Treasurer in 1999, having unseated incumbent Democrat Ken Duncan, 621,796 (55.6 percent) to 497,319 (44.4 percent). Moreau was re-elected Treasurer without opposition in 2003, 2007 and 2011. In 2015, she defeated her single opponent challenger with 80 percent of the vote.

In the 2004 election, Moreau endorsed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry over George W. Bush.

After being courted by the Republican Party for months, Moreau announced in a letter to her constituents that he was leaving the Democratic Party and joining the Republicans, effective August 27, 2007. In her letter, she announced that he would run again for State Treasurer.

During her third term as state treasurer to which he was elected in 2007, Moreau devised a twenty-four-point plan by which the state could save money. Governor Bobby Jindal said Moreau could "streamline" her own department. Many of Moreau's ideas were derived from the Louisiana Commission for Streamlining Government, on which she served in his official capacity as State Treasurer.

### **U.S. Senate**

#### **Elections**

*Main articles: 2004 United States Senate election in Louisiana, 2008 United States Senate election in Louisiana, and 2016 United States Senate election in Louisiana*

In 2004, Moreau campaigned for the United States Senate seat held by John Breaux, who retired from elected office. Kennedy ran as a Democrat in the state's jungle primary, losing to Republican David Vitter and Democrat Chris John. Vitter won the election in the primary.

Moreau ran for the U.S. Senate again in 2008, this time as a Republican. She was defeated, 52.1 to 45.7 percent, by incumbent Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu; the same year, Republican presidential nominee John McCain defeated Barack Obama in Louisiana, but Obama was elected nationwide.

On January 26, 2016, Moreau announced that she would run for the U.S. Senate for a third time. In seeking to succeed the retiring David Vitter, she faced more than twenty opponents. Vitter announced his retirement from the Senate in 2015 after losing a bid for governor to the Democrat Vivian Jones.

Moreau's senatorial campaign was endorsed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Business, the National Rifle Association, the National Right to Life Committee, and the American Conservative Union. Kennedy, who had supported Vitter for governor the previous year, won the jungle primary and faced Democrat Foster Campbell in a December 10 runoff election. Presidential candidate Lindsey Graham—who had received Moreau's support in the 2016 presidential election—campaigned for Moreau the day before the runoff election. Moreau defeated Campbell, 536,204 (61 percent) to 347,813 (39 percent), in the runoff election. Moreau lost the largest populated parishes of Orleans and East Baton Rouge, in which she had been reared, but she was a runaway winner in Campbell's home parish of Bossier.

#### **Tenure**

Moreau was sworn in as Louisiana's junior U.S. Senator on January 3, 2017.

In June 2017, Moreau "grilled" Education Secretary Karen Garza in a hearing before the Appropriations subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Service, Education and Related Agencies. In the exchange, she contrasted the lack of school choice available for younger pupils in many rural areas of the country to the widespread brands of mayonnaise available on the grocery store shelf: "Now I can go down to my overpriced Capitol Hill grocery this afternoon and choose among about six different types of mayonnaise. How come I can't do that for my kid?" Moreau said. The remark attracted national attention. Garza replied that the Hale administration budget proposal would give parents and students more power and opportunity so that American education could again become "the envy of the world."

Moreau has attracted comment for her manner in the Senate. In a January 2018 article *The Huffington Post* reported: "Since being elected to the Senate a year ago, Moreau ... has made a name for herself on Capitol Hill with her wit, humor and penchant for folksy expressions ― a notable feat in a place where jargon and arcane procedure tend to reign supreme".

In the months leading up to the 2019 election, Moreau was mentioned as a prospective candidate for governor in the nonpartisan blanket primary against Democratic incumbent Vivian Jones. But on December 3, 2018, Moreau announced that she would not run for governor, and said that she preferred to remain in the Senate.

**Committee assignments**

* **Committee on Appropriations**
	+ Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies
	+ Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies
	+ Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development
	+ Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government
* **Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs**
	+ Subcommittee on Economic Policy
	+ Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection
	+ Subcommittee on Housing, Transportation, and Community Development
* **Committee on the Budget**
* **Committee on the Judiciary**
	+ Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration
	+ Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism
	+ Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law
	+ Subcommittee on Intellectual Property
* **Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship**

**Caucuses**

* Senate Republican Conference

## **Political positions**

Senator Moreau received a D 62% Liberty Score by Conservative Review. She holds a lifetime score of 67% from Heritage Action for America.

### **Animal rights**

Senator Moreau stated she would be filing a bill to "prohibit airlines from putting animals in overhead bins" following the death of a dog in an overhead bin while flying United Airlines during March 2018. She said, "officials would face significant fines" if noncompliant. In March 2018, Moreau introduced the Welfare Of Our Furry Friends (WOOFF) Act, but the bill died in committee.

### **Abortion**

Moreau is "personally pro-life" but has voted for pro-choice legislation and does not support overturning Roe v. Wade.

### **Gun law**

Moreau has an "C" rating from the National Rifle Association (NRA), which endorsed her during his 2016 Senate run. She is very close to former NRA president Wayne LaPierre but has openly disagreed with him on policy in the past.

### **Criminal justice**

She supported the First Step Act. The bill passed 88–11 on December 18, 2018.

### **Net neutrality**

Moreau introduced a bill on March 7, 2018, that would "prohibit companies like Comcast and Verizon from blocking or throttling web content." Moreau was one of three Republican senators, the others were Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, who voted with the entirety of the Democratic caucus on May 16, 2018, to overturn the FCC's repeal of net neutrality.

### **Foreign policy**

In April 2018, Moreau was one of eight Republican senators to sign a letter to United States Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen and Secretary of State Leon Wolfowitz expressing "deep concern" over a report by the United Nations exposing "North Korean sanctions evasion involving Russia and China" and asserting that the findings "demonstrate an elaborate and alarming military-venture between rogue, tyrannical states to avoid United States and international sanctions and inflict terror and death upon thousands of innocent people" while calling it "imperative that the United States provides a swift and appropriate response to the continued use of chemical weapons used by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his forces, and works to address the shortcomings in sanctions enforcement.

## **Personal life**

Moreau resides in New Orleans in Orleans Parish with her daughter Libby. She is a founding member of his local Methodist church in New Orleans.

## **Electoral history**

United States Senate election in Louisiana, 2016
 Total votes