Shelley Moore Capito is the incumbent United States Senator from West Virginia who succeeded Jay Rockefeller on January 3, 2015. Formerly, she was a member of the US House of Representatives from West Virginia’s 2nd District from 2001 to 2015.
Early Life and Education
Shelley Moore Capito was born on November 26, 1953 in Glen Dale, West Virginia. Her father, Arch Alfred Moore Jr., was Governor of West Virginia from 1985 to 1989 and 1969 to 1977. Raised in Charleston, Capito went to Holton-Arms School for school education and later joined Duke University for an undergraduate degree in zoology.
Shelley went to the University of Virginia Curry School of Education for her post-graduate studies.
Personal Life
Shelley Moore is married to Charles L. Capito and the couple has three children named Shelley, Charles and Moore.
Career
Shelley Moore Capito has been in the American politics since a very long period of time. Yet, the most significant part of her political career started in 2000. Running for US House of Representatives in the West Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District Election. Capito defeated Democratic opponent Jim Humphreys and officially assumed office on January 3, 2001. Two years later, she sought for another term at the office and saw a landslide victory against Humphreys with 60.04% votes. Similarly, Capito won the third term against Erik Wells with 57.46% votes.
In 2006, Shelley faced Democratic Mike Callaghan in the congressional election. She won with a 57.18%-42.82% margin. Likewise, as of 2008, Shelley had around 37k votes more than Democratic Anne Barth. Moore won her sixth term with 68.46% votes against Virginia Lynch Graf’s 29.69% votes in 2010. Above all, in 2012, Capito had her largest congressional victory with 69.8% votes in favor i.e. 158.2k votes.
As Shelley’s term in the US House came to end, she decided to run in the 2014 West Virginia US Senate General Election. Acquiring 87.5% votes for the Republican nomination, she landed on the Senate General Election to face Democratic Natalie Tennant and a few other third party candidates. Shelley received 62.12% votes and assumed the office of the US Senate on January 3, 2015.
As part of the US Senate, Shelley Moore has worked on the following committee assignments:
- Rules and Administration Committee
- Joint Committee on the Library
- Energy and Natural Resources Committee
- Environment and Public Works
- Appropriations Committee
Throughout her career, Moore Capito has modeled herself as a politician who doesn’t abide by guided ideologies. Although a Republican, she voted against tax reductions for oil companies. This is the kind of notion that separates her from the crowd.
Donald Trump and Shelley Moore Capito
Reportedly, Shelley was one of the probable candidates for Vice President of the United States or running mate of the Republican nominee Donald Trump. As of May 2016, she was one of the politicians who met Trump in Washington to talk about the candidacy. However, Shelley was eventually dropped and Indiana Governor Mike Pence was chosen as Trump’s running mate.
