While working for Anschutz, Bennet befriended fellow Wesleyan alumnus John Hickenlooper, informally advising the latter's successful campaign for mayor of Denver.[17] Moving back into public service, Bennet served for two years as Hickenlooper's Chief of Staff.
The Denver Board of Education selected Bennet as superintendent of Denver Public Schools on June 27, 2005, and he took office on July 1. He had no experience as a school administrator.[13] Under Bennet's leadership, the Denver Public School system grew student enrollment, decreased dropout rates, and improved graduation rates and college enrollment. Those trends have continued since Bennet left the office.[20] Bennet collaborated with educators and community members to develop the Denver Plan, a commitment to increase student success by focusing on higher expectations, better professional learning opportunities for educators, and deeper engagement with the community and stakeholders.[21] Bennet and the City of Denver also partnered with private philanthropists to increase college enrollment and affordability for DPS graduates.[22][23] The Denver Post said of his tenure, "Bennet has been a force—pushing reforms and steering the state's second-largest district to a culture of success."[24]
In 2008 Bennet persuaded the Denver Board of Education to enter into a 30-year, $750 million financial bond transaction with variable interest rates designed to fluctuate as economic conditions changed. According to The New York Times, "In short order, the transaction went awry because of stress in the credit markets, problems with the bond insurer and plummeting interest rates." As of 2010 the school system had paid $115 million in interest and other fees, at least $25 million more than it originally anticipated.[25]
In his January 2011 article in Time titled "Shaking Schools Up in an Already Tumultuous Year", Andrew J. Rotherham said of Bennet: "If the federal No Child Left Behind Act is modified this year, or if anything else of significance happens in Washington on education policy, this Colorado Democrat will be at the center of it."[31]
Bennet ran for election for a full term as senator from Colorado in the 2010 election.[32] On September 16, 2009, former Colorado HouseSpeakerAndrew Romanoff announced his campaign to challenge Bennet for the Democratic nomination.[33] Bennet received endorsements from President Obama, U.S. Senator Mark Udall, and U.S. Representatives Betsy Markey, Jared Polis, and John Salazar of the Colorado congressional delegation.[32] He raised $7 million and had a four-to-one cash advantage over Romanoff.[34]
On August 10, 2010, Bennet defeated Romanoff in the primary and won his party's nomination,[35] facing Republican candidate Ken Buck. The campaign became one of the most expensive in the country, with the candidates spending a reported $15 million combined, and outside groups another $30 million. Bennet portrayed Buck as an extremist conservative opposed to abortion and direct election of senators, while Buck and the groups supporting him characterized Bennet as a big-spending liberal.[36]
On November 3, the day after polls closed, Bennet was declared the winner and Buck conceded. Bennet won by 851,590 votes (48.1%) to 822,731 (46.4%). He subsequently returned to Washington, D.C. in January 2011 to start a full six-year term. After the election, Obama said Bennet "perfectly reflects the qualities of the ruggedly independent state he has been chosen to serve."[37]
Bennet was reelected to a second term on November 8, 2016, defeating the Republican nominee, El Paso County Commissioner Darryl Glenn. Bennet received 50% of the vote to Glenn's 44%.[38] Following the election, Obama said Bennet was one of the "gifted Democratic politicians" who could lead the party in the future.[39][40]
Bennet was reelected to a third term in 2022, defeating the Republican nominee, businessman Joe O'Dea, who was notably critical of former President Donald Trump.[41] Bennet received 55.9% of the vote to Odea's 41.3%.[42] This was the first Senate election in which Bennet received a majority of the vote.
Tenure
In the wake of the 2021 storming of the United States Capitol, Bennet called for the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution to be invoked to remove Trump from office.[43] In 2024, Bennet was one of the first Democratic senators to publicly state that he worried President Joe Biden would lose the presidential race to Donald Trump, saying, "Donald Trump is on track, I think, to win this election, and maybe win it by a landslide, and take with him the Senate and the House. So for me, this isn't a question about polling. It's not a question about politics. It's a moral question about the future of our country."[44]
Most of Bennet's positions are considered liberal.[47] The American Conservative Union gave Bennet a 6% lifetime conservative rating in 2020.[48]
Abortion
Bennet supports abortion rights and has voted to continue federal funding to Planned Parenthood.[49] After Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022, Bennet said that the "radical majority on the Supreme Court demolished fifty years of precedent" and called it an "activist decision".[50]
Agriculture
In March 2019, Bennet was one of 38 senators to sign a letter to United States Secretary of AgricultureSonny Perdue warning that dairy farmers "have continued to face market instability and are struggling to survive the fourth year of sustained low prices" and urging his department to "strongly encourage these farmers to consider the Dairy Margin Coverage program."[51]
In 2018 Bennet criticized the Trump administration for attempting to cherry-pick data to misinform the public on marijuana use.[54] In response, the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy committed to be completely objective and dispassionate in its analysis of marijuana.[55]
In 2009, Bennet co-sponsored the Solar Manufacturing Jobs Creation Act, legislation that would have provided a tax credit to support solar manufacturing in the U.S.[59] The legislation was not enacted.[60]
He was one of the handful of Democratic senators who have supported construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, voting for it in 2013,[61] 2014,[62] and 2015.[63]
In February 2021, Bennet was one of seven Democratic senators to join Republicans in blocking a ban of hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking.[64]
Environmental policy
In October 2017, Bennet was one of 19 senators to sign a letter to Administrator of the Environmental Protection AgencyScott Pruitt questioning Pruitt's decision to repeal the Clean Power Plan, asserting that Pruitt used "mathematical sleights of hand to overstate the costs of industry compliance with the 2015 Rule and understate the benefits that will be lost if the 2017 repeal is finalized", and that science denial and math tricks fail to "satisfy the requirements of the law, nor will it slow the increase in frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, the inexorable rise in sea levels, or the other dire effects of global warming that our planet is already experiencing."[65]
In November 2018, Bennet was one of 25 Democratic senators to cosponsor a resolution in response to findings of the Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change report and National Climate Assessment. The resolution affirmed the senators' acceptance of the findings and their support for bold action to address climate change.[66]
In March 2019, Bennet was an original cosponsor of a bipartisan bill intended to mandate that the Environmental Protection Agency declare per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances as hazardous substances that can be addressed with cleanup funds via the EPA Superfund law and require that polluters undertake or pay for remediation within a year of the bill's enaction.[67]
In April 2019, Bennet was one of 12 senators to sign a bipartisan letter to top senators on the Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development advocating that the Energy Department be granted maximum funding for carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS), arguing that American job growth could be stimulated by investment in capturing carbon emissions and expressing disagreement with President Trump's 2020 budget request to combine the two federal programs that do carbon capture research.[68]
In September 2019, Bennet was one of eight senators to sign a bipartisan letter to congressional leadership requesting full and lasting funding of the Land and Water Conservation Act in order to aid national parks and public lands, benefit the $887 billion American outdoor recreation economy, and "ensure much-needed investment in our public lands and continuity for the state, tribal, and non-federal partners who depend on them."[69]
Bennet was a member of the Senate Democrats' Special Committee on the Climate Crisis, which published a report of its findings in August 2020.[70]
Foreign policy
In July 2017, Bennet co-sponsored the Israel Anti-Boycott Act (s. 720), which permits U.S. states to enact laws that require contractors to sign a pledge saying they will not boycott goods from Israel, or their contracts will be terminated.[71]
In March 2018, Bennet voted against tabling[clarification needed] a resolution spearheaded by Bernie Sanders, Chris Murphy, and Mike Lee that would have required Trump to withdraw American troops either in or influencing Yemen within the next 30 days unless they were combating Al-Qaeda.[72]
In November 2018, Bennet joined senators Chris Coons, Elizabeth Warren, and a bipartisan group of lawmakers in sending the Trump administration a letter raising concerns about the People's Republic of China's undue influence on media outlets and academic institutions in the United States. They wrote: "In American news outlets, Beijing has used financial ties to suppress negative information about the CCP. In the past four years, multiple media outlets with direct or indirect financial ties to China allegedly decided not to publish stories on wealth and corruption in the CCP. In one case, an editor resigned due to mounting self-censorship in the outlet's China coverage. Beijing has also sought to use relationships with American academic institutions and student groups to shape public discourse."[73]
In April 2019, Bennet was one of 34 senators to sign a letter to Trump about cutting aid to Central America. It encouraged Trump "to listen to members of your own Administration and reverse a decision that will damage our national security and aggravate conditions inside Central America," asserting that Trump had "consistently expressed a flawed understanding of U.S. foreign assistance" since becoming president and that he was "personally undermining efforts to promote U.S. national security and economic prosperity" by preventing the use of Fiscal Year 2018 national security funding. The senators argued that foreign assistance to Central American countries created less migration to the U.S. by helping to improve conditions in those countries.[74]
Government shutdown
On January 24, 2019, Bennet gave an impromptu 25-minute speech on the Senate floor in response to comments by Senator Ted Cruz. He questioned the authenticity of Cruz's concern about difficulties that the 2018–19 government shutdown was causing to first responders,[75] recalling that in 2013 Cruz led a shutdown that lasted 16 days at a time when Colorado was experiencing flooding.[76] In less than eight hours the speech became the most-watched Senate floor speech in C-SPAN history.[77]
Gun law
As of 2022, Bennet has an "F" grade from the NRA Political Victory Fund.[78] This has fallen from a "C+" grade in 2010.[79] In 2012, Bennet joined then Colorado Senator Mark Udall in asking for stricter gun control, in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. After the shooting, Bennet said, "In Colorado, we support the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms, we support the ability of people to hunt and recreate and to protect their families and homes, and we want to keep the wrong weapons out of the hands of the wrong people."[80]
Bennet participated in the Chris Murphy gun control filibuster, demanding that gun laws be changed in the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting. During his participation in the filibuster, Bennet talked about the 2012 Aurora, Colorado shooting, citing that as a response to the shooting, the state of Colorado closed gun sale loopholes and now requires background checks for any gun purchase.[81]
In 2013, Bennet voted against a Senate Amendment 711 to S. 649 (The Safe Communities, Safe Schools Act of 2013), an amendment introduced by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) that would have reinstated the federal assault weapons ban. The amendment was defeated 40–60 with one Republican, Mark Kirk, voting in favor and 16 Democrats (including independent Senator Angus King, who caucuses with Democrats) against.[83] Also in 2013 Bennet voted to strengthen the background check system and to ban high-capacity magazines.[citation needed]
Bennet owns a shotgun, which he has called a "hunting shotgun".[84]
Health care policy
Bennet voted in support of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act signed by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. In November 2009, when the bill was still working its way through Congress, Bennet said that he would support health care reform even if it meant losing the election.[85] In 2016, describing the healthcare costs in western and central Colorado as among the highest in the United States, Bennet said he "didn't have answers" and called it "next to impossible" to fix the Affordable Care Act given partisan attitudes at that time.[86]
As part of a group of Democrats proposing "more incremental steps to broaden health care coverage", as opposed to Bernie Sanders's push for "Medicare for All", Bennet and Senator Tim Kaine have proposed "Medicare X". Medicare X would "create a public option modeled after Medicare alongside private options on the ObamaCaremarketplaces".[87] In 2019 Bennet and Kaine reintroduced the latest version of the plan, which would also "expand access to tax credits."[88]
In January 2019 during the 2018–19 United States federal government shutdown, Bennet was one of 34 senators to sign a letter to Commissioner of Food and DrugsScott Gottlieb recognizing the efforts of the FDA to address the shutdown's effect on public health and employees while remaining alarmed "that the continued shutdown will result in increasingly harmful effects on the agency's employees and the safety and security of the nation's food and medical products."[89]
In April 2019 Bennet and Senator Chuck Grassley's Advancing Care for Exceptional (ACE) Kids Act, legislation that creates an option for states and families to provide improved coordination of care for children with complex medical conditions, was signed into law.[90][91]
Immigration policy
In September 2009, Bennet cosponsored the DREAM Act (S. 729), which proposed amending the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 by giving residency to immigrants enrolled in higher education programs or serving in the military.[92] In 2013, he was a member of the Gang of Eight, a bipartisan group of four Democratic and four Republican U.S. senators who introduced comprehensive immigration reform legislation.[93] Their bill, the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013, passed the U.S. Senate with a vote of 68–32, but stalled in the House due to opposition from the Republican majority.[94] He later cosponsored the Dream Act of 2017.[95] After President Trump ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, Bennet worked with a bipartisan group of senators to provide a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers with stronger border protections.[96]
In August 2018, Bennet was one of 17 senators to sign a letter spearheaded by Kamala Harris to United States Secretary of Homeland SecurityKirstjen Nielsen demanding that the Trump administration take immediate action in attempting to reunite 539 migrant children with their families, citing each passing day of inaction as intensifying "trauma that this administration has needlessly caused for children and their families seeking humanitarian protection."[97]
In June 2019, Bennet and six other Democratic senators led by Hawaii Senator Brian Schatz sent letters to the Government Accountability Office and the suspension and debarment official and inspector general at the US Department of Health and Human Services citing recent reports that showed "significant evidence that some federal contractors and grantees have not provided adequate accommodations for children in line with legal and contractual requirements" and urged the officials to determine whether federal contractors and grantees are in violation of contractual obligations or federal regulations and should thus face financial consequences.[98]
In July 2019, following reports that the Trump administration intended to cease protecting spouses, parents and children of active-duty service members from deportation, Bennet was one of 22 senators led by Tammy Duckworth to sign a letter arguing that the protection gave service members the ability "to fight for the United States overseas and not worry that their spouse, children, or parents will be deported while they are away" and that its termination would both cause service members personal hardship and negatively affect their combat performance.[99]
Also in July 2019, Markey and 15 other Senate Democrats introduced the Protecting Sensitive Locations Act, which would require, except in special circumstances, that ICE agents get approval from a supervisor before engaging in enforcement actions at sensitive locations, and that agents receive annual training in addition to reporting annually on enforcement actions in those locations.[100]
LGBT rights
Bennet supports same-sex marriage. He lauded the Supreme Court's 2015 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide, stating on his Senate website "Marriage is a fundamental right that same-sex couples deserve to enjoy, and now they will have the same rights and opportunities that the law grants to Susan [Bennet's spouse] and me."[101]
Bennet is the author of legislation to direct resources to improve the sexual health of older Americans, including LGBTQ+ and rural senior populations.[102] He is an original co-sponsor of the Equality Act. In 2022, Bennet voted for the Respect for Marriage Act.[103]
Bennet speaking at the 2019 Iowa Democratic Wing Ding in August 2019
Bennet's 2020 presidential campaign began on May 2, 2019, when he officially declared his candidacy during an appearance on CBS This Morning.[105] Bennet was previously mentioned as a possible presidential candidate following his viral response to Senator Ted Cruz in January 2019.[75] In February and March 2019 he traveled to early primary states such as Iowa and New Hampshire.[106][107][108] In late March Bennet said he was "very inclined" to run for the presidency.[109]
Following his announcement, Bennet campaigned in Iowa on May 5 and 11 and South Carolina on May 31. He qualified for the first set of debates on June 3, and appeared in the June 27 debate, receiving 8.1 minutes of airtime.[110] He appeared in the second set of debates, on July 26 and 27, this time receiving 10.6 minutes of airtime.[110] He failed to qualify for the remainder of the debates. He also failed to qualify for the Iowa and New Hampshire debate, making him the candidate to fail to qualify for a debate the most times (six).[111]
Bennet received 164 votes in the Iowa caucuses, and 958 in the New Hampshire primary. He dropped out of the race on February 11, 2020, the night of the New Hampshire primary.[112]
Though not raised in an observant household, Bennet acknowledges his Jewish roots.[115][116][117] He has said that he was "raised with two different heritages, one [that] was Jewish and one [that] was Christian," and that he believes in God.[3]
On April 3, 2019, Bennet announced he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and underwent surgery later that month.[118][119] Following the surgery, Bennet's office said the procedure was "completely successful" and that he requires no further treatment.[120]
As of 2019[update], according to Forbes Magazine, Bennet's net worth was $15 million.[121]
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↑ Lane, Anthony (May 14, 2009). "The accidental senator". Colorado Springs Independent. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
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