Ted Yoho

Theodore Scott Yoho (born April 13, 1955) is an American politician, veterinarian, and businessman, who served as the U.S. representative from FL's 3rd congressional district from 2013 until 2021.

He is a member of the Republican Party.

Yoho was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on April 13, 1955.

He earned a bachelor's degree in animal science at the University of Florida in 1983 and thereafter attended the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, from which he received a doctorate in veterinary medicine.

He is a member of the American Veterinary Medical Association, the Florida Veterinary Medical Association, the Florida Association of Equine Practitioners, the Florida Cattlemen's Association, and the National Rifle Association of America.

Yoho ran for the newly redrawn FL's 3rd congressional district.

In the Republican primary, he defeated longtime incumbent Cliff Stearns, first elected in 1988; State Senator Steve Oelrich; and James Jett, the Clay County clerk of court—34%–33%–19%–14%.

Yoho defeated Stearns by 829 votes, a margin of 1.1 percentage points.

Yoho won 11 of the district's 13 counties.

Yoho won the November general election, 65% to 32%, against Democratic candidate J.R. Gaillot.

At age 11, he moved with his family to Florida, where he attended school with his future wife, Carolyn, in the 4th grade.

Yoho earned his associate-of-arts degree at Broward Community College.

In the 2012 Republican primary election for the district, Yoho pulled a major upset against long-term incumbent Congressman Cliff Stearns, who had first been elected in 1988.

Before being elected to Congress, Yoho had been a veterinarian and small business owner in North Central Florida for 30 years.

While running for Congress in 2012, Yoho supported Florida Governor Rick Scott's controversial reduction of early voting while backing further reductions.

Yoho later joked about limiting the right to vote once again exclusively to property owners.

He also expressed support for the Bilderberg conspiracy theory.

Yoho took office on January 3, 2013.

He is a member of the Tea Party Caucus and the House Liberty Caucus.

He says that he supports reduction in taxes: replacing the current tax code with the Fair Tax (a broad national consumption tax on retail sales), reducing corporate tax rates, and eliminating federal programs that cannot be balanced with revenues.

According to the CBO, there would still be a deficit even if all discretionary spending (all Federal programs except pensions, Medicare and Social Security) were stopped.

Yoho advocates reducing spending and taxes, though has not yet introduced a plan that will lead to a balanced budget.

Yoho also is opposed to raising the debt ceiling unless significant spending cuts are made; he is also opposed to earmarks in legislation.

His district is one of the lowest-taxed in Florida, located primarily within Suwannee River Management District (lower proportion of property taxes), per capita retail sales in the district are significantly lower than the state average, and it has the fewest non-farm related businesses of Florida's congressional districts.

Yoho has not made any indication on his level support of the farm bill.

In 2013, he became widely known for stating that breaching the debt ceiling and defaulting on the national debt "would bring stability to the world markets".

This position was widely panned by Democrats as well as some of his fellow Republicans, such as Representative Reid Ribble, who called the position "crazy talk".

In 2014, Yoho was challenged by conservative Republican Jake Rush for his seat.

Rush painted Yoho as a "liberal" and appealed to voters' conservatism to try to win the Republican nomination.

In 2015, Yoho mounted a campaign to challenge John Boehner for the Speakership of the US House of Representatives in an attempt to get the conference to the second ballot.

The bloc of dissenting members were four votes shy of achieving their goal.

He and his Democratic colleague John Conyers offered bipartisan amendments to block the U.S. military training of Ukraine's Azov Battalion of the Ukrainian National Guard.

Some members of the battalion are openly white supremacists.

Yoho has been described as "crazy" and as someone who "destroyed" America by GQ and Rolling Stone magazines.

In December 2019, Yoho announced that, honoring his term-limit pledge, he would not run for re-election to Congress in 2020.

In July 2020, Yoho accosted Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over her public comments that an increase of crime in New York City was due to the high rise in poverty.

According to a reporter from The Hill who overheard the conversation, the congressman called her "disgusting" and "out of your freaking mind."

Ocasio-Cortez called him "rude," and reporters overheard Yoho calling her a "fucking bitch" as he walked away from the conversation.

Ocasio-Cortez confirmed the incident on Twitter and on the House floor, but Yoho's office denied his comments, claiming that he "made a brief comment to himself as he walked away summarizing what he believes her policies to be: bullshit."

He later addressed the incident on the House floor, saying, "Having been married for 45 years with two daughters, I'm very cognizant of my language. The offensive name calling, words attributed to me by the press were never spoken to my colleagues and if they were construed that way, I apologize for their misunderstanding."