Patrick Morrisey facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Patrick Morrisey
34th Attorney General of West Virginia
Incumbent
Assumed office January 14, 2013
Governor	Earl Ray Tomblin Jim Justice
Preceded by	Darrell McGraw
Personal details
Born	Patrick James Morrisey (1967-12-21) December 21, 1967 (age 56) New York City, New York, U.S.
Political party	Republican
Education	Rutgers University, New Brunswick (BA) Rutgers University, Newark (JD)

Patrick James Morrisey (born December 21, 1967) is an American politician and attorney serving as the 34th Attorney General of West Virginia since 2013. He is a member of the Republican Party.

Morrisey was elected Attorney General of West Virginia in 2012, becoming the first Republican to serve in the role since 1933. Running for the United States Senate in 2018, Morrisey won the Republican Party nomination, but was narrowly defeated by incumbent Democratic Senator Joe Manchin in the November general election.

Early life and education

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Morrisey grew up in Edison, New Jersey. His father was an account manager at U.S. Steel, while his mother worked as a registered nurse. Morrisey ran cross-country and played on his high school's tennis team, before he graduated from St. Thomas Aquinas High School / Bishop George Ahr High School in 1985.

Morrisey graduated with honors from Rutgers College with a Bachelor of Arts in history and political science in 1989. He also attended Rutgers School of Law–Newark, receiving his juris doctor in 1992.

Career in politics, law, and lobbying

Morrisey was active in moderate Republican politics early in life having worked on George Bush's Presidential campaign in 1988, Cary Edwards’ gubernatorial campaign in 1989, and was press secretary of Christine Todd Whitman's U.S. Senate campaign in the 1990.

After graduating from Rutgers, Morrisey lived in Westfield, New Jersey and opened a private law firm in 1992. He practiced health care, election, regulatory and communications law at Arent Fox, a national white shoe law firm and lobbying firm, from 1995 to 1999.

Morrisey served as deputy staff director and chief health counsel for the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce from 1999 to 2004, where he worked on the passage of the Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness Response Act and the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act (establishing Medicare Part D). The Medicare Part D Act was authored by then Congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito. He ran unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives in New Jersey's 7th congressional district in 2000, receiving 9% of the vote in the Republican primary. Morrisey ran as a political insider touting the endorsement of thirteen members of the U.S. House at the time.[1]

From 2004 to 2012, Morrisey worked as a lobbyist in Washington D.C. He worked for the corporate law firm Sidley Austin before he joined King & Spalding in 2010, becoming a partner. As a lobbyist, he was viewed as an expert on health and drug-related regulations and legislation. He was paid $250,000 to lobby on behalf of a pharmaceutical trade group.

Attorney General

In 2012, Morrisey ran for Attorney General of West Virginia against Darrell McGraw, a five-term incumbent. He defeated McGraw and was sworn in on January 14, 2013, making him the first Republican state Attorney General to serve in West Virginia since 1933.

Supreme Court

In late January 2017, President Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court to replace the late Antonin Scalia. The following day, Morrisey sent a letter to Senate leaders along with the Attorneys General of 19 other states to express support for Gorsuch and urge the Senate to confirm him without delay. Morrisey said he wrote the letter out of concern for the court's impact on residents of West Virginia, citing a 2016 court decision (5-4, with Antonin Scalia casting the crucial vote) to stay President Obama's Clean Power Plan, which Morrisey believed would put people out of work.

2020 Presidential election intervention

On December 8, 2020, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the states of Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, where certified results showed Joe Biden the electoral victor over President Donald Trump.

By December 2020, Paxton had been under indictment on securities fraud charges relating to activities prior to taking office, and in October 2020, numerous high-level assistants of his own office have accused him of involvement in "bribery, abuse of office and other crimes".

Morrisey joined Paxton's lawsuit seeking to overturn the results of the presidential election by challenging election processes in four states where Trump lost. He had repeated an abundance of false, disproven and unsupported allegations regarding mail-in ballots and voting in those four battlegrounds. The news came after West Virginia's Governor Jim Justice, who had yet to congratulate Biden for winning the presidency, said Trump called him to discuss the lawsuit. He said he encouraged Morrisey to join the Texan's attempt. "I'm sure our attorney general will make the right move," said Justice, a strong Trump supporter.

Secretary of State Mac Warner on Wednesday declared the state's election results, becoming the last in the nation to certify the winner of the presidential race. He said the Texas lawsuit is a “novel approach” and supported letting the courts decide.

Texas and 16 other states' Attorneys General who support Paxton's challenge of the election results alleged numerous instances of unconstitutional actions in the four states' presidential ballot tallies, arguments that had already been rejected in other state and federal courts. In Texas v. Pennsylvania, Paxton asked the United States Supreme Court to invalidate the states' sixty-two electoral votes, allowing Trump to be declared the winner of a second presidential term. Because the suit has been characterized as a dispute between states, the Supreme Court retains original jurisdiction, though it frequently declines to hear such suits. There was no evidence of consequential illegal voting in the election. Paxton's lawsuit included claims that had been tried unsuccessfully in other courts and shown to be false. Officials from each of the four states described Paxton's lawsuit as having recycled false and disproven claims of irregularity. The merits of the objections were sharply criticized by legal experts and politicians. Election law expert Rick Hasen described the lawsuit as "the dumbest case I've ever seen filed on an emergency basis at the Supreme Court." Nebraska Republican Senator Ben Sasse said the situation of Paxton initiating the lawsuit, "looks like a fella begging for a pardon filed a PR stunt", in reference to Paxton's own state and federal legal issues (securities fraud charges and abuse of office allegations). On December 11, the U.S. Supreme Court quickly rejected the suit which Morrisey had joined, in an unsigned opinion.

Political positions

Morrisey at the 2017 Conservative Political Action Conference

Sanctuary cities

Morrisey led a multi-state coalition of attorneys general in defending the right of states to prohibit sanctuary cities within their borders. A unanimous federal appeals court decision found in favor of the states.

Guns

Morrisey has A+ ratings from the NRA Political Victory Fund and the West Virginia Citizen's Defense League. He has secured reciprocity agreements with other states, allowing the concealed carry licenses of other states to be valid within West Virginia, and vice versa.

Immigration

In July 2017, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton led a group of Republican Attorneys General from nine other states, including Morrisey, plus Idaho Governor Butch Otter, in threatening the Donald Trump administration that they would litigate if the president did not terminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy that had been put into place by President Barack Obama. On September 5, 2017, Trump rescinded the DACA policy. He delayed implementation for six months to allow Congress the time to legislate a solution for young people eligible for DACA. Morrisey supported Trump's move and said "I applaud President Trump for having the courage of his convictions to uphold the rule of law and stop this Obama-era program. DACA was unconstitutional and represented an unlawful, unilateral action by the Obama administration."

In June 2018, Morrisey was among Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate seeking to cast the blame for the Trump administration family separation policy on their Democratic opponents. Morrisey criticized West Virginia U.S. Senator Joe Manchin for supporting the "Keep Families Together Act" authored by Dianne Feinstein, arguing that Manchin was "putting the interest of illegal immigrant criminals and the agenda of liberal Washington elites ahead of West Virginia families."

Drug companies

In 2013, questions arose about Morrisey's ties to Cardinal Health, his campaign funds, and the ongoing lawsuit filed against Cardinal Health. After Morrisey said he had recused himself from the suit, he met privately on several occasions with representatives of the company. Additionally, Cardinal Health paid nearly $1,500,000 to Morrisey's wife's lobbying firm. Although the West Virginia Bar found that Morrisey's previous role as a lobbyist was not an ethics violation, it said his wife's association with Cardinal Health could "diminish the integrity of the process and create the appearance of impropriety." Eventually, Cardinal Health settled a lawsuit brought by the state attorney general's office by paying a $20,000,000 fine for violating consumer protection laws.

In 2016, Morrisey ended a lawsuit against Miami-Luken, after the drug firm paid $2.5 million to settle. According to The Charleston Gazette, "Morrisey, a former lobbyist for a trade group that represents Miami-Luken and other drug distributors, inherited the lawsuit in 2013 after ousting longtime Attorney General Darrell McGraw." It was the largest settlement against pharmaceutical companies in West Virginia's history.

2018 U.S. Senate election

On July 10, 2017, Morrisey announced his intention to run for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Joe Manchin. During the Republican primary, he ran as a conservative and presented himself as an outsider in contrast to Rep. Evan Jenkins. During the primary, Morrisey was attacked by his main opponents, Jenkins and Don Blankenship, for his career as a lobbyist. Amid criticism of Morrisey's lobbying career, as well as his wife's lobbying career, the Morrisey campaign pledged that his wife would stop lobbying if Morrisey were to win election to the Senate. On May 8, 2018, Morrisey defeated Jenkins and Don Blankenship in the Republican primary with more than 34% of the votes (47,571 votes).

In the November 2018 general election, Morrisey was defeated by incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Joe Manchin. Manchin received 49.6% of the vote to Morrisey's 46.3%, with Libertarian candidate Rusty Hollen receiving 4.2% of the votes cast.

2024 gubernatorial election

On April 4, 2023, Morrisey announced his candidacy for governor of West Virginia in the 2024 election.

Personal life

Morrisey moved to Jefferson County, West Virginia in 2006. His wife, Denise, has worked as a lobbyist in the District of Columbia for over 30 years.

Electoral history