Jenkins, Lynn, 1963-

<p>In November 2008 Lynn Jenkins flipped a seat in the United States House from northeast Kansas—one of only four Republicans that year to defeat a Democratic incumbent. After Republicans regained control of the House two years later, Jenkins won a seat on the influential Ways and Means Committee and rose through the ranks to become vice chair of the Republican Conference. “If we want our economy to recover and our nation to prosper once again, we have to stop taking so much away and give decisions back to the people,” she said. “Instead of politicians in Washington pretending to know what’s best, let the people decide for themselves.”</p>

<p>Lynn Jenkins was born Lynn Haag on June 10, 1963, in Holton, Kansas, to Gale and Dixie Haag. A sixth generation Kansan, Jenkins grew up on a dairy farm milking cows before and after school each day. After graduating from Holton High School in 1981, she studied at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas, before continuing her studies at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in accounting in 1985. While completing her studies, she married Scott Jenkins, who grew up on a farm down the road from her own. The couple raised two children, Haley and Haden, and settled in Topeka, where Jenkins, a licensed CPA, worked as an accountant. Jenkins and her husband divorced in 2009.</p>

<p>Jenkins’s political philosophy took shape as she grew up in rural northeast Kansas. “My upbringing on the farm in a very conservative community shaped my political views that government can’t solve all the problems that good, hard-working Kansans can,” she later reflected. Jenkins often volunteered for local Republican candidates during election season by campaigning door to door and stuffing envelopes. In 1997, when her state representative resigned, Jenkins ran in the special election to fill the seat but lost by a single vote. Undiscouraged, she ran in the 1998 general election and won. After serving one term in the state house, she won a seat in the state senate. She resigned halfway through her state senate term to serve as Kansas state treasurer, where she worked to cut taxes, limit spending, and return millions of dollars in unclaimed property to state residents.</p>

<p>Lynn Haag Jenkins (born June 10, 1963) is an American politician and lobbyist who served as the U.S. Representative for Kansas's 2nd congressional district, in office from 2009 to 2019. She previously served as Kansas State Treasurer from 2003 to 2008, in the Kansas House of Representatives from 1999 to 2000 and the Kansas Senate from 2000 to 2002. She is a member of the Republican Party.</p>

<p>She is a founder of Maggie's List, a political action committee designed to increase the number of conservative women elected to federal public office. Jenkins announced in January 2017 that she would not be running for re-election in 2018 and she left the House when her term expired on January 3, 2019.</p>

<p>Jenkins was born in Holton, Kansas, and is a sixth-generation Kansan. She was raised on a dairy farm in Holton, where she attended high school. Later she graduated from Kansas State University and Weber State College with an accounting major and an economics minor. She is a Certified Public Accountant.</p>