Gordon H. Smith
Gordon Harold Smith (born May 25, 1952) is an American politician, businessman, and academic administrator who served as a United States Senator from the state of Oregon. A Republican, he served two terms in the Senate from 1997 to 2009. On September 18, 2009, he was appointed president of the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB). As of 2024, he is the last Republican to represent Oregon in the U.S. Senate.
Gordon Smith
Early life and family[edit]
Smith was born in Pendleton, Oregon, to Jessica (Udall) and Milan Dale Smith on May 25, 1952.[1] Smith's family moved to Bethesda, Maryland during his childhood, when his father became an Assistant United States Secretary of Agriculture. He was involved with the Boy Scouts of America and earned the rank of Eagle Scout.[2] Smith is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). After graduating from high school, Smith served for two years as an LDS Church missionary in New Zealand.
Smith then went to college at Brigham Young University, received his Juris Doctor from Southwestern University School of Law, and became an attorney in New Mexico and Arizona. He moved back to Oregon in the 1980s to become director of the family owned Smith Frozen Foods company in Weston, Oregon.[3]
Smith and his wife, Sharon, adopted three children in the 1980s, including two sons (Morgan and Garrett) and a daughter (Brittany). On September 8, 2003, Garrett, then a 21-year-old college student majoring in culinary arts, died by suicide. Smith wrote a book entitled Remembering Garrett, One Family’s Battle with a Child’s Depression.[4] In 2004, President George W. Bush signed the Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Act, authorizing $82 million for suicide-prevention and awareness programs at colleges.[5]
Smith is also a member of the Udall political family. His mother was a cousin of the late Representatives Mo Udall (D-AZ) and Stewart Udall (D-AZ), and Smith is a second cousin of Senators Mark Udall (D-CO) and Tom Udall (D-NM). He is a double second cousin of both of them, as their great-grandparents were a pair of brothers and a pair of sisters who married. All three of them were candidates for Senate in the 2008 elections. Smith was the only Republican and incumbent senator of the group, and the only one of the three to lose his electoral bid. Smith's brother, Milan Dale Smith, Jr., is a federal judge appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006.
Smith is a member of the board of directors of the International Republican Institute.[6] In 2010, another second cousin, fellow Republican Mike Lee of Utah, was elected to the Senate.[7]
On March 31, 2012, Smith was called as an area seventy in the LDS Church.[8] He was released from this assignment in August 2022.[9]
Early political career[edit]
Smith entered politics with his election to the Oregon State Senate in 1992, and became president of that body in 1995. Later in 1995, he ran in a special election for a Senate seat vacated by the resignation of Bob Packwood, but was narrowly defeated in the January 1996 special election by then-Congressman Ron Wyden. Smith carried all but eight counties, but could not overcome an 89,000-vote deficit in Multnomah County, home to Portland–far exceeding the overall margin of 18,200 votes.
Post-Senate career[edit]
In the aforementioned private meeting with LDS Church leaders in 2009, Smith shared information he said "may be classified" about Iran's nuclear program. (Smith's spokesman has since stated that none of the information shared was, in fact, classified.) Smith also mentioned instances in which he had pushed officials of various international governments to allow an increased LDS missionary presence in their countries.[41]
Smith was named as president and CEO of the National Association of Broadcasters on September 18, 2009 and began his tenure with the trade association on November 1, 2009. Since then, Smith has led the association's lobbying efforts on Capitol Hill and at the Federal Communications Commission regarding issues affecting the television and radio broadcast industry. These issues include voluntary incentive auctions of broadcast TV spectrum, efforts by record labels to institute a performance fee on local radio stations for music airplay, and retransmission consent rules. Broadcast industry executives have credited Smith's leadership with improving NAB's lobbying clout and influence.[50] In October 2012, Smith was named as one of Washington's top lobbyists by The Hill.[51] He was named Radio Ink‘s Radio Executive Of The Year in 2018.[52]
On March 31, 2012, Smith was called as an area seventy, an ecclesiastical leadership position, in the LDS Church.[53]
Smith has announced his retirement from the NAB, effective January 1, 2022. He will be replaced by NAB’s Chief Operating Officer, Curtis LeGeyt.[54]