Jackie Speier

Jackie Speier served in the U.S. House of Representatives for California from 2008 until her retirement in 2023.

Speier was born May 14, 1950, in San Francisco, California. She received her Bachelor of Arts from the University of California-Davis in 1972 and her Juris Doctorate from the University of California Hastings School of Law in 1976. From 1973 to 1978, Speier worked as a staff member for California Representative Leo Joseph Ryan. In 1978, she was part of Ryan's fact-finding mission investigating allegations of human rights abuses by Jim Jones and his Peoples Temple followers in Jonestown, Guyana. The team, along with members of the Peoples Temple who wished to leave with them, was ambushed by security guards from the Peoples Temple as they were boarding the plane to leave. Speier was shot five times, and Congressman Ryan and several others were killed. That evening, over 900 members of the Peoples Temple died in Jonestown in a mass murder-suicide, including Jim Jones, leader of the Peoples Temple.

Speier began her career as an elected official on the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, representing the residents of the San Francisco Peninsula from 1980 to 1986. She served in the California state Assembly from 1986 to 1998 and in the California state Senate from 1998 to 2006. In April 2008, she was elected to Congress through a special election after the death of Rep.Thomas Lantos, filling the seat that had previously been held by Rep. Leo Ryan.

For information on Speier's policy subject areas, committee appointments and sponsored/co-sponsored legislation during her time in the U.S. House of Representatives, please visit her profile on https://www.congress.gov.

Sources:

Ballotpedia (n.d.). "Jackie Speier" Ballotpedia. Retrieved October 24, 2022. https://ballotpedia.org/Jackie_Speier