Peter Welch
Peter Francis Welch (born May 2, 1947) is an American lawyer and politician serving since 2023 as the junior United States senator from Vermont. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the U.S. representative for Vermont's at-large congressional district from 2007 to 2023. He has been a major figure in Vermont politics for over four decades, and is only the second Democrat to be elected a senator from the state.
This article is about the United States politician. For the British actor, see Peter Welch (actor).
Peter Welch
Bernie Sanders
Peter Shumlin
Robert Daniels
Allen Avery
Herbert Ogden
Richard McCormack
Welch was a member of the Vermont Senate from 1981 to 1989, including terms as minority leader. He was the Senate's president pro tempore from 1985 to 1989, the first Democrat to hold the position. In 1988, he gave up his seat to run for the United States House of Representatives and lost the Democratic primary to Paul N. Poirier. He was the Democratic nominee for governor of Vermont in 1990, losing the general election to Republican Richard A. Snelling.
Welch continued to practice law and returned to politics in 2001, when he was appointed to fill a vacancy in the Vermont Senate. He was re-elected in 2002 and 2004 and was Senate president from 2003 to 2007. In 2006, Welch was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, succeeding Bernie Sanders, who was elected to the United States Senate. In November 2021, Welch announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination in the 2022 United States Senate election in Vermont to succeed retiring Senator Patrick Leahy.[1][2] On August 9, 2022, he won the Democratic primary. On November 8, 2022, Welch won the general election, defeating Republican nominee Gerald Malloy.[3][4][5] Elected at age 75, he is the oldest person to become a freshman senator, a record previously held by Frederick H. Gillett.
Early life and career[edit]
Welch was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1947. He attended Cathedral High School (now Pope Francis Preparatory School). In 1969, he graduated from the College of the Holy Cross with a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), magna cum laude, in history.[6] Welch spent a year in Chicago as a fellow at the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, then enrolled in the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, earning his Juris Doctor (J.D.) in 1973.[7][8]
Welch "worked with low-income people on Chicago's West Side in the late 1960s"[9] as a community organizer. He worked for an organization that was affiliated with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and its activities included attendance at an SCLC national convention in Atlanta. Participants there strategized and heard remarks from Ralph Abernathy, Hosea Williams, and Martin Luther King Jr.[10]
Welch worked for Lloyd Cutler, who later was White House Counsel during the administrations of presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, at a Washington law firm.[9]
After graduating from law school, Welch moved to Vermont in 1973. He was a law clerk for Judge Henry Black of the Vermont Superior Court.[9] He worked for several years as a public defender for low-income clients in Windsor County and Orange County.[9] Welch was a partner for 30 years in the personal injury law firm Welch, Graham & Manby in White River Junction, Vermont.[7]
Vermont government[edit]
In 1980, Welch was elected to the Vermont Senate from Windsor County. In his second term, Welch was chosen as the Minority Leader, and he became president pro tempore after Democrats gained control of the Senate.[7] Welch was the first Democrat to be Vermont's senate president, since Vermont was a bastion for the Whigs and then the Republicans for more than 100 years beginning in the 1830s.[11]
In 1988, Welch left the Vermont Senate to make an unsuccessful run for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. House of Representatives.
In 1990, Welch won the Democratic nomination for governor of Vermont but lost the general election to Republican Richard Snelling.[7]
Welch did not run for another office for more than a decade; in 2001, Governor Howard Dean appointed him to fill a vacant Vermont Senate seat in Windsor County. He was elected to the seat in 2002 and reelected in 2004, and again was president pro tempore.[7]
Political positions[edit]
Gun control[edit]
Welch participated in the 2016 United States House of Representatives sit-in to support gun control.[38]
Welch supports a national assault weapons ban.[39]
Israel and Palestine[edit]
On November 26, 2023, Welch called for an indefinite ceasefire in the 2023 Israel-Hamas war. He was the third U.S. senator, the second member of Vermont's congressional delegation, and the first senator from Vermont to do so.[41]
In January 2024, Welch voted for a resolution, proposed by Bernie Sanders, to apply the human rights provisions of the Foreign Assistance Act to U.S. aid to Israel's military. The proposal was defeated, 72 to 11.[42]
Personal life[edit]
Welch is married to Margaret Cheney, a former member of the Vermont House of Representatives who was appointed to the Vermont Public Service Board in 2013.[43] His first wife, Joan Smith, died of cancer in 2004.[44] Welch has five stepchildren from his first marriage and three from his second.[45]