Tom Cole

Cole's Ph.D. thesis was Life and Labor in the Isle of Dogs: The Origins and Evolution of an East London Working-Class Community, 1800–1980.

Thomas Jeffery Cole (born April 28, 1949) is the U.S. representative for OK's 4th congressional district, serving since 2003.

He is a member of the Republican Party and serves as the chairman of the House Rules Committee.

Cole graduated from Grinnell College in 1971 with a B.A. in history.

His postgraduate degrees include an M.A. from Yale University (1974) and a Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma (1984), both in British history.

He did research abroad as a Thomas J. Watson Fellow and was a Fulbright Fellow (1977–78) at the University of London.

He served as an assistant professor in history and politics in college before entering politics and winning political office.

He chaired the Oklahoma Republican Party for much of the 1980s.

He resigned from the state senate mid-term to accept an appointment as executive director of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Following his mother, who served as a state representative and senator, Cole was elected to the Oklahoma Senate in 1988, serving until 1991.

He backed a number of candidates who were elected to office during the Republican Revolution of 1994, when it gained dominance in the state.

Among their clients have been Keating, J. C. Watts, Tom Coburn, Frank Lucas, Mary Fallin, Wes Watkins, Steve Largent, Chip Pickering, and Linda Lingle.

From 1995 to 1999, he served as Oklahoma's Secretary of State, appointed by Governor Frank Keating.

He assisted with the recovery efforts after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

Building on his involvement in national politics, Cole resigned from Keating's administration when asked to become chief of staff to the Republican National Committee.

Cole spent two years working as a paid consultant for the United States Chamber of Commerce, but his primary effort in politics was as a political consultant for candidates.

Along with partners Sharon Hargrave Caldwell and Deby Snodgrass, his firm (Cole, Hargrave, Snodgrass and Associates) played a large part in strengthening the Republican Party in Oklahoma.

During his initial campaign for the House of Representatives in 2002, Cole received the endorsement of Watts, the popular outgoing congressman.

This helped him win the general election over Democratic nominee and former Oklahoma State Senator Darryl Roberts, with 53.8% of the vote to Roberts's 46.1%.

Following the 2006 election cycle, the members of the House Republican Conference elected Cole to the post of NRCC Chairman, placing him in charge of national efforts to assist Republican candidates for Congress.

Cole has established a solidly conservative voting record in the House.

He has consistently voted anti-abortion and for gun rights.

He also has pro-business positions, supporting free trade, the military, veterans, and educating other congressmen on American Indian issues.

He favors loosening immigration restrictions and imposing stricter limits on campaign funds.

During his tenure as the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) from 2007 to 2009, he was the fourth-ranking Republican in the House.

A member of the Chickasaw Nation, Cole is one of five Native Americans in Congress who are enrolled tribal members.

The others are fellow Republicans Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma (Cherokee) and Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma (Choctaw), and Democrats Sharice Davids of Kansas (HoChunk) and Mary Peltola of Alaska (Yupik).

In 2022, Cole became the longest-serving Native American in the history of Congress.

Cole was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, the son of John D. Cole and Helen Te Ata (née Gale), who was the first Native American elected to the Oklahoma Senate.

They returned to Oklahoma, where family on both sides lived.

His ancestors had been in the territory for five generations, and he was raised in Moore, halfway between Oklahoma City and Norman.

Cole has won at least 63% of the vote in each of his eight reelection campaigns, and he ran unopposed in 2010.

In 2012, he sponsored H.R. 5912, which would prohibit public funds from being used for political party conventions.

This legislation passed the House in September but awaits action by the Senate.

During his tenure, Cole has been a leading voice for strengthening protections for Native American women under the Violence Against Women Act.

In June 2013, after another failure of the United States farm bill in Congress, Cole called the failure inexcusable.

His district in Oklahoma includes some of the state's farming communities, and if the Farm Bill passed, it would have saved $40 billion over a ten-year period.

As chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch, Cole was responsible for introducing the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, 2015 (H.R. 4487; 113th Congress).

The bill would appropriate $3.3 billion to the legislative branch for FY 2015, about the same amount it received in FY 2014.

According to Cole, the bill meets its goals "in both an effective and efficient manner, and has done so in a genuinely bipartisan, inclusive and deliberative fashion."