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Judiciary of Ukraine

The judicial system of Ukraine is outlined in the 1996 Constitution of Ukraine. Before this there was no notion of judicial review nor any Supreme court since 1991's Ukrainian independence when it started being slowly restructured.

Although judicial independence exists in principle, there is little separation of juridical and political powers in practice. Judges are subjected to pressure from political and business interests. Ukraine's court system is widely regarded as corrupt.

Although there are still problems with the performance of the system, it is considered to have been much improved since the last judicial reform introduced in 2016. The Supreme Court is regarded as being an independent and impartial body. It has on several occasions ruled against the Ukrainian government.

Since 2014, Ukraine has allowed videotaping of court sessions without obtaining the specific permission of the judge, within the limitations established by law. In 2015 the Open Court Project was launched to videotape civil, commercial, and administrative court proceedings. The Open Court Project has videotaped over 7000 court cases in courts at different levels. The videos are stored, indexed and published in the public domain. In 2017 NGO Open Ukraine has launched the VR Court Project aimed at videotaping court sessions with 3D 360 degree portable video cameras to create VR video records of court sessions.

Courts
Ukrainian courts enjoy legal, financial and constitutional freedom guaranteed by measures adopted in Ukrainian law in 2010.

The judicial system of Ukraine consists of three levels of courts of general jurisdiction.

Prior to the judicial reform introduced in 2016 the system consists of four levels. The Cassation Court of Ukraine existed until 2003. Those courts were recognized as unconstitutional by the Constitution Court of Ukraine.

Local courts
Ukraine has 74 district courts. In 2018 they replaced the 142 local general courts. For example, in Kyiv ten district courts were eliminated and six district courts created. The Pechersky District Court is a particularly active one, as it rules over most of the business community of Kyiv.

Courts of appeal

 * Courts of Appeal (combining criminal and civil jurisdiction), consisting of:
 * regional courts of appeal;
 * courts of appeal of the cities of Kyiv.

Prior to the judicial reform introduced in 2016, there were parallel Specialized Courts of Appeal (either commercial or administrative jurisdiction) consisting of the commercial courts of appeal and the administrative courts of appeal.

The Supreme Court

 * Supreme Court is the highest court within the system of courts of general jurisdiction, conducting the review regarding unequal application of the rules of substantive law by the cassation courts and subject to cases when international judicial institution the jurisdiction of which is recognized by Ukraine has established the violation of international obligations by Ukraine.

The Constitutional Court of Ukraine

 * The Constitutional Court of Ukraine is a special body with authority to assess whether legislative acts of the Parliament, President, Cabinet or Crimean Parliament are in line with the Constitution of Ukraine. This court also gives commentaries to certain norms of the constitution or laws of Ukraine (superior acts of Parliament).

The High Anti-Corruption Court

 * the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine is to be established before the end of 2018. Cases concerning corruption in Ukraine will be bought directly to this court. Appeals will be considered by a completely separate Appeal Chamber of the High Anti-Corruption Court. The law on the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine came into force on 14 June 2018.

Abolished high courts with specialized jurisdiction
In the judicial reform introduced in 2016 the following three courts were abolished and its tasks transferred to special chambers of the Supreme Court of Ukraine.
 * The High Specialized Court on Civil and Criminal Cases, covering civil and criminal cases;
 * The High Administrative Court of Ukraine, covering administrative cases;
 * The High Commercial Court of Ukraine, covering commercial cases.

The rulings of the High (sometimes translated as Supreme) Administrative Court of Ukraine could not be appealed.

Judges
In 2012 Ukraine had about 8,000 judges.

Since the juridical reform of 2016 judges are appointed by the President of Ukraine upon their nomination by the Supreme Council of Justice. Prior judges were appointed by presidential decree for a period of five years, after which the Ukrainian parliament confirmed them for life in an attempt to insulate them from politics. This five year probation period was also abolished in 2016. Judges are protected from dismissal (save in instances of gross misconduct). Immunity from prosecution was guaranteed to judges until 2016. (This immunity could be lifted by parliament. ) Currently a judge is protected from liability resulting from their judicial actions only.

After judicial reforms, there was, effectively, a hiring freeze, which increased case backlog and caused a dearth of 2,600 judges, about a third of the judiciary, as they retired or were dismissed. In the later half of 2023, due to requirements of accession to the European Union, Ukraine re-opened two judicial governance bodies and sought to hire 1,100 judges over a period of months, and 2,000 judges over a period of years.

Lay assessors
Ukraine has a jury system; although almost all cases are heard by either a single judge or two judges accompanied by assessors. In fact so few people in Ukraine face a jury trial that in 2018 survey by the Center for Civil Liberties, 64% of respondents claimed that such a phenomenon does not exist in Ukraine. Ukrainian law allows jurors to hear only those criminal cases where the sentence can reach life imprisonment. But even then they are not mandatory. A jury is only appointed if the accused so wishes. Jurors are not formed from random citizens, but rather from those who have previously applied for this role. Citizens are prohibited from joining a jury if: A Ukrainian jury is made up of five jurors (three main and two reserve) and two professional judges who are actively involved in decision-making.
 * they do not speak Ukrainian
 * elderly people over the age of 65
 * persons with chronic mental or other illnesses that interfere with the work of the jury
 * persons with an outstanding criminal record
 * persons people's deputies, members of the Cabinet of Ministers, judges, law enforcement and judicial officials, the military, other officials, lawyers, notaries
 * persons who have received an administrative penalty for corruption in the previous year
 * persons who are recognized as having limited legal capacity or incapable

Jurors are prohibited from communicating with anyone other than the court about the merits of the case without the permission of the presiding judge. They may not divulge details known to them or gather information about the case outside of the court proceedings. Jurors are financially compensated.

Administration
The Congress of Judges (З'їзд суддів України) is the highest body of judicial self-government.

The Council of Judges is responsible for the enforcement of the decisions of the Congress and their implementation in the period between congresses, and decides on the convocation of the Congress.

The State Judicial Administration provides organizational support of the judiciary and represents the judiciary to the Cabinet of Ministers and the Verkhovna Rada.

The High Judicial Qualifications Commission of Ukraine conducts the selection of judicial candidates, submits to the High Council of Justice recommendations on the appointment of a candidate for the subsequent introduction of the submission of the President of Ukraine, makes recommendations on the election of a permanent post, and conducts disciplinary proceedings including dismissal.

The High Council of Justice "is a collective independent body that is responsible for formation of the high-profile judge corpus capable of qualified, honest and impartial exercise of justice on a professional basis; and for making decisions regarding violations by judges and procurators of the requirements concerning their incompatibility and within the scope of their competence of their disciplinary responsibility". Three members of the council are automatically assigned for holding the following positions: Chairman of the Supreme Court, Minister of Justice, and Prosecutor General. The other 17 members are elected for a period of six years. The council consists of 20 members. It was created on January 15, 1998.

Law
The 2010 Judicial System and Status of Judges Act is the legal basis for the organization of the judiciary and the administration of justice in Ukraine.

Procedure
Since January 1, 2010 it is allowed to hold court proceedings in Russian on mutual consent of parties. Citizens, who are unable to speak Ukrainian or Russian are allowed to use their native language or the services of a translator.

Corruption
A Ukrainian Ministry of Justice survey of Ukrainians in 2009 revealed that only 10 percent of respondents trusted the national court system. Less than 30 percent believed that it was possible to receive a fair trial in Ukraine.

Ukrainian politicians and analysts have described the system of justice in Ukraine as "rotten to the core" and have complained about political pressure put on judges and corruption.

Ukrainian judges have been arrested while taking bribes. Independent lawyers and human rights activists have complained Ukrainian judges regularly come under pressure to hand down a certain verdict.

In 2013, a Transparency International Global Corruption Barometer report showed that 66% of the Ukrainian public considered the judiciary to be the most corrupt institution in the country. Twenty-one percent of Ukrainians admitted they had paid bribes to judicial officials themselves.

Conviction rate
Courts maintained a 99.5 percent conviction rate from 2005 until 2008, equal to the conviction rate of the Soviet Union. In 2012 this number was 99.83 percent. Suspects are often incarcerated for long periods before trial.

Flaws in the system
Prosecutors in Ukraine have greater powers than in most European countries. According to the European Commission for Democracy through Law "the role and functions of the Prosecutor’s Office is not in accordance with Council of Europe standards".

Ukraine has few relevant corporate and property laws; this hinders corporate governance. Ukrainian companies often use international law to settle conflicts. Ukraine recognizes the verdicts of the European Court of Human Rights.

Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Thomas Hammarberg stated in February 2012 that systemic deficiencies in the functioning of the Ukrainian judicial system seriously threatened human rights.

On July 25, 2012, a mass protest march took place from early morning to about 16:00 across the city of Kyiv of about 3,500 participants mostly of whom were sports fans of FC Dynamo Kyiv. The event took place soon after a decision was adopted by the Holosiivsky District Court of Kyiv City on the 2011-12 nationally renown Pavlichenko criminal case convicting a family of Pavlichenkos (father and son) to long-term sentence for killing a judge of the Shevskivsky District Court of Kyiv City Serhiy Zubkov. On 24 February 2014 the Verkhovna Rada (Ukraine's parliament) decided to release all political prisoners, including father and son Pavlichenko.

History
Ukraine's judicial system was inherited from that of the Soviet Union and the former Ukrainian SSR. As such, it had many of the problems which marred Soviet justice, most notably a corrupt and politicised judiciary. Lawyers have stated trial results can be unfairly fixed, with judges commonly refusing to hear exculpatory evidence, while calling frequent recesses to confer privately with the prosecutor. Insiders say paying and receiving bribes is a common practice in most Ukrainian courts. Fee amounts depend on jurisdiction, the crime, real or trumped-up, and the financial wherewithal of the individual or company involved.

The Prosecutor-General's Office – part of the government – exerted undue influence, with judges often not daring to rule against state prosecutors. Those who did faced disciplinary actions; when a Kyiv court ruled for opposition politician Yulia Tymoshenko, the presiding judge was himself prosecuted. The courts were not even independent from each other, and it was commonplace for trial court judges to call the higher courts and ask how to decide a case. Courts were often underfunded, with little money or resources. It was not uncommon for cases to be heard in small, cramped courtrooms with the electricity cut off while prisoners were unable to attend because of lack of transport from jails to courtrooms.

Reformers highlighted the state of the judiciary as a key problem in the early 1990s and established a number of programmes to improve the performance of the judiciary. A Ukraine-Ohio Rule of Law Program was established in 1994 which brought together lawyers and judges from the American state of Ohio, including members of the Ohio Supreme Court, with their Ukrainian counterparts. The United States Agency for International Development supported these and other initiatives, which were also backed by European governments and international organisations.

These efforts proved controversial among some of the judicial old guard, but a band of reformist judges – dubbed the "judicial opposition" – increasingly gained support from reformers in local administrations who pushed for an end to judicial corruption. Judges were indicted en masse in Dnipro in the early 1990s, and later on judges from the Mykolayiv city court and the Moskovskyy district court of Kyiv were put on trial for corruption.

Major changes were made to the judicial system when the law "On the court system" was passed on 7 February 2002, creating a new level of judiciary and enacting institutional safeguards to insulate judges from political pressure.

President Viktor Yanukovych formed an expert group to make recommendations how to "clean up the current mess and adopt a law on court organization” on March 24, 2010. One day after setting this commission Yanukovych stated “We can no longer disgrace our country with such a court system.”

In December 2011 certain economic crimes were decriminalized.

Concrete steps the Azarov Government proposed the abolition of pre-trial detention for non-violent crimes, promoting experienced judges with strong records and punishing bribe-taking and corruption in the judiciary. A law passed in 2010 improved the basic salaries of judges, and a more rigorous method of selecting candidates for judges was introduced. But reforms brought many new problems: the Supreme Court lost almost all of its powers, judges become very dependent on the Supreme Council of Justice, and the ability to sue the government was severely limited.

A new criminal code came into effect on 20 November 2012.

On 8 April 2014 the Ukrainian Parliament adopted the law "On Restoring confidence in the judicial system of Ukraine". This bill established the legal and organizational framework for a special audit of judges of courts of general jurisdiction.

On 26 September 2015 Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk claimed Ukraine's court system would be reformed following the example of the National Police of Ukraine, meaning employing new personnel en masse.

In the last judicial reform introduced in 2016 the court system was completely overhauled, including the abolishing of certain courts. Advocacy operates in Ukraine to provide professional legal assistance. The independence of the lawyers is guaranteed. Only a lawyer represents another person in court, as well as defending against criminal charges.

A new Supreme Court was launched in December 2017.

The Kyiv Administrative District Court was disestablished in December 2022 due to its alleged corruption and powerful jurisdiction over national government agencies.

title: Judiciary of Ukraine


text:
Patty Clancy

Patricia M. Clancy is a former Republican member of the Ohio General Assembly, representing the 8th District from 2005 to 2007. She is the daughter of former Cincinnati Mayor and U.S. Congressman Donald D. Clancy. Clancy first ran for the Ohio House of Representatives in 1996, after Representative Lou Blessing opted to run for the Ohio Senate. She won, and was reelected in 1998 and 2000. For the 124th Ohio General Assembly, Clancy was named as majority leader of the House. She won a final term in the House 2002, before facing term limits.

By 2004, Clancy had served four two-year terms in the Ohio House of Representatives and was prevented by Ohio's term limits law from running for re-election again. At the same time, another Cincinnati-area politician, Republican state Sen. Louis W. Blessing Jr., had also run up against term limits. So, Blessing and Clancy ran for each other's seats, both succeeding and holding the seats for the Republican party. Clancy defeated the Democratic nominee, real estate agent Jeannette Harrison.

Halfway through her first term in the Senate, Clancy sought and received an appointment as the assistant chief probation officer for the Hamilton County Common Pleas Court. As a result, she resigned her Senate seat on October 9, 2007. In 2008, she was elected Hamilton County Clerk of Court.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Patty Clancy


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Romanian Bridgehead

The Romanian Bridgehead (Przedmoście rumuńskie; Capul de pod român) was an area in southeastern Poland that is now located in Ukraine. During the invasion of Poland in 1939 at the start of the Second World War), the Polish commander-in-chief, Marshal of Poland Edward Rydz-Śmigły, ordered all Polish troops fighting east of the Vistula (approximately 20 divisions still retaining the ability to co-operate) to withdraw towards Lwów and then to the hills along the borders with Romania and the Soviet Union on 14 September. After the Soviets attacked on 17 September, Rydz-Śmigły ordered all units to withdraw to Romania and Hungary, but communications had become disrupted although smaller units crossed outside the major battles.

The plan was a default plan in case it was impossible to defend the Polish borders, and it assumed that the Polish forces would be able to retreat to the area, organise a successful defence until the winter and hold out until the promised French offensive on the Western Front had started. Rydz-Śmigły predicted that the hills, valleys, swamps and the rivers Stryj and Dniester would provide natural lines of defence against the German advance. The area was also home to many ammunition dumps that were prepared for the third wave of Polish troops, and it was linked by transport to the Romanian port of Constanța, which could be used to resupply the Polish troops.

The plan is one of the reasons that the Polish–Romanian alliance was not activated by Poland. Poland and Romania had been allied since 1921, and the defensive pact was still valid by 1939. However, the Polish government decided that it would be much more helpful to have a safe haven in Romania and the safe port of Constanța that could accept as many Allied merchant ships as would be required to keep Poland fighting. Most of the Polish Navy and merchant marine had been evacuated prior to 1 September (see Peking Plan) and would operate from French and British ports and deliver the supplies through Romania.

In adherence with the secret protocol of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, which provided for the partition of Poland between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, the Soviets invaded Poland from the east during the early hours of 17 September and violated their non-aggression pact with Poland. However, the French, despite their promises, had not begun any significant offensive against Germany, which made it impossible for the Polish Army to hold out, at least in eastern parts of the country. During the late hours of that day, the Polish government and members of the military high command crossed the Polish–Romanian border with the intention of relocating to France, where the Polish forces in the west were being formed.

Polish units were ordered to evacuate Poland and to reorganise in France. Polish units launched new counteroffensives in attempt to clear a path towards the Romanian Bridgehead, such as Kraków Army in the Battle of Tomaszów Lubelski. Some of Kazimierz Sosnkowski's units managed to evade German capture and continued the fight in Lwów, but others were stopped and captured by Soviet armored units. It was the intervention by the Red Army, which created a two-front war, that sealed the fate of the Romanian Bridgehead. Fragmented Polish units attempted to push southward and clear paths with limited success and started diversionary skirmishes, which slowed the Germans. The Polish defeat at the Battle of Lwów by the Germans and the Soviets disintegrated the efforts to clear a path to the Romanian Bridgehead. Nonetheless, many small groups of Polish soldiers crossed the border at night.

As many as 120,000 Polish troops withdrew through the Romanian Bridgehead area to neutral Romania and Hungary. Most of those troops joined the newly-formed Polish Armed Forces in the West in France and the United Kingdom during 1939 and 1940. Until Germany attacked the Soviet Union during Operation Barbarossa and the United States joined the war, the Polish Army was one of the largest forces of the Allies.

The Romanian government also received the treasury of the National Bank of Poland in 1939. Part of it, consisting of 1,261 crates containing 82,403 kg of gold, was loaded aboard a commercial ship in the port of Constanța and transported to Western Europe. The transport was escorted by ships of the Romanian Navy to prevent its interception by Soviet submarines in the Black Sea. The second part of the treasury was deposited in the National Bank of Romania and was returned to Poland on 17 September 1947.

title: Romanian Bridgehead


text:
Lou Blessing

Louis W. Blessing Jr. (born August 1, 1948) of Cincinnati, Ohio, is an American politician of the Republican party.

Career
After graduation from the University of Cincinnati, he received a Juris Doctor degree from Northern Kentucky University law school. As an attorney, Blessing worked from the Hamilton County Common Pleas Court before being elected as a Colerain Township Trustee.

Blessing's career at the statehouse began in 1983, when he replaced Representative Helen Fix in a suburban Cincinnati district. He went on to serve seven terms in the House, for a total of fourteen years. He never faced considerable opposition in either a primary or general election throughout his tenure.

With term limits newly enacted and looming, eight-term incumbent Stanley Aronoff decided to retire in 1996 before being forced out of the Senate. As a result, Blessing forfeited an eighth term in the House for a run in the Senate. Facing no opposition in the primary, Blessing went on to win the general election with 65% of the vote. In 2000, Blessing was heavily favored in the strongly Republican district. Against Democrat Stuart Manning, Blessing won a second term, securing 63% of the vote.

In December 2002, Blessing, while traveling on I-71 in Ohio, was arrested and charged with a DUI after an Ohio state patrol officer found the state lawmaker had a blood-alcohol level of .11 percent when given a breathalyzer test, just over the legal limit.

By 2004, Blessing was facing term limits himself in the Senate. With Representative Patty Clancy also facing a term limit in the House, there was an opportunity for both Blessing and Clancy to run for each other's seats. However, Blessing first faced primary competition in Keith Corman. He went on to win the primary election with 52% of the electorate. Blessing went on to win the general election over Joseph R. Wolterman by about 7,000 votes, and retook a seat in the House after eight years in the Senate. Blessing was the first legislator post term-limits to go from the House to the Senate and then back to the House. He won reelection easily in 2006, 2008 and 2010.

For the 126th General Assembly, Blessing was named by Speaker of the House Jon Husted as vice chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and for the 127th General Assembly was chosen as chairman of that committee.

With William G. Batchelder elected as minority leader of the House for the 128th General Assembly, Blessing was tabbed as assistant leader. However, when Republicans retook the majority in 2010, Blessing was again chosen for the second-highest Republican leadership position, speaker pro tempore. He also serves on the committees of criminal justice, rules and reference (as chairman); health and aging and its subcommittee on retirement and pensions; and state government and elections.

Social issues
Along with Tracy Maxwell Heard, Blessing has introduced a plan to reduce Ohio's rising prison population and use part of the expected cost savings to strengthen felony probation supervision. While current law provides that certain adoption placement requirements do not apply to a stepparent, grandparent, or a guardian, Blessing has introduced a bill that would extend the exemption to the husband or wife of a grandparent.

Collective bargaining
As a member of the House Commerce and Labor Committee, Blessing played a key role in shaping a bill on collective bargaining reform, which will go forth to limit such for public employees. He favored limiting the same provisions for firefighters and law enforcement, although some cite Wisconsin's bill as allowing their collective bargaining to continue. Blessing has stated that while law doesn't state that employers have to pay non-union members the same wages as union members, it often happens anyway. He believed the bill would ultimately make it to John Kasich's desk for approval, which it did. He voted for the bill to pass out of committee, and did the same on the House floor. Blessing has stated that public employees shouldn't be concerned that they may receive pay cuts, and that the bill will actually help public employees. He has also stated that the bill will bring more accountability to the public sector. When asked if he would be willing to share in sacrificing his own pay, Blessing stated that he earns his pay, and isn't ashamed of what he makes.

Voter ID laws
In 2011, as state House speaker pro tem, Blessing sponsored voter ID legislation. The legislation was criticized by the nonprofit group Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, which opposed the law as erecting barriers to the right to vote. The highly controversial bill passed the state House on a party-line vote on a mostly party-line vote of 57-38.

title: Lou Blessing


text:
Boughton

Boughton may refer to:

People

 * Boughton (surname)
 * Boughton Baronets, titled English family line

England

 * Boughton, Cheshire
 * Boughton, Norfolk
 * Boughton, Northamptonshire that gives it name to:
 * Boughton House, a country house in Northamptonshire
 * Boughton railway station, planned terminus of the Northampton & Lamport Railway
 * Boughton, Nottinghamshire
 * Boughton Aluph, Kent
 * Boughton Green, Kent
 * Boughton Lees, Kent
 * Boughton Malherbe, Kent
 * Boughton Monchelsea, Kent
 * of which Boughton Green is a part
 * Boughton Street, Kent
 * Boughton under Blean, Kent

Wales

 * Broughton, Vale of Glamorgan

title: Boughton


text:
Frederica von Stade

Frederica von Stade (born 1 June 1945) is a semi-retired American classical singer. Best known for her work in opera, she was also a recitalist and concert artist, and she recorded more than a hundred albums and videos. She is especially associated with operas by Mozart and Rossini, and also with music by French and American composers, most notably Jake Heggie. A Chevalier of France's Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, twice the winner of a Grand Prix du Disque and nominated nine times for a Grammy award, she is widely regarded as the pre-eminent lyric mezzo-soprano of her generation.

Early life
Frederica von Stade—always Flicka (her childhood nickname) to her family, friends and fans—was born in Somerville, New Jersey on 1 June 1945, the daughter of Sara Clucas von Stade and Charles Steele von Stade, a 1941 US Polo Champion, who had been killed by a landmine while serving with the US Army in Germany during World War II. Her early infancy was largely spent in the affluent hunt country of Somerset County, New Jersey, with a brief interlude in Greece and Italy during her mother's short-lived second marriage to a US State Department official, Horace Fuller.

She began her education at Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart and Holy Trinity School in Washington DC, where her mother worked as a secretary for the CIA. When her mother relocated to Oldwick, New Jersey, she transferred to Far Hills Country Day School: FHCDS saw her in the first of her many trouser roles when she appeared there as Nanki-Poo in The Mikado. During her final high school years, she boarded at the Convent of the Sacred Heart, no longer extant, in Noroton, Connecticut. Her introduction to opera came at the Salzburg Festival in 1961, when her mother took her to see Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Christa Ludwig in Der Rosenkavalier.

With the help of a graduation gift from her grandfather, she spent a gap year studying and working in Paris before getting a job as a salesgirl in the stationery department of Tiffany's, New York City. She began her performing career acting in summer stock at the Long Wharf Theater and singing in nightclubs and in industrial musicals. In 1966 she visited New York's Mannes School of Music intending to take a part-time course in sight-reading, but was persuaded to enrol in its undergraduate music programme instead. In the second year of her course, she began studying opera under Sebastian Engelberg, who remained her teacher and most important mentor until his death in 1979.

Career
After a successful appearance as a semi-finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 1969, von Stade was invited to join the Met's young artist programme. A summons from the rehearsal room to a private audition with Sir Rudolf Bing resulted in her signing a three-year contract as a comprimario. She made her Met debut as the Third Boy in Die Zauberflöte on 10 January 1970, and went on to play eighteen other apprentice roles as "everybody's page or their maid—I was an operatic domestic".

In 1971, the Met allowed her to moonlight in San Francisco and in Santa Fe as Sesto and Cherubino respectively, but in 1972, hungry for more challenging roles, she decided to embark on a career as a freelance. She debuted as Cherubino in Houston and as Rosina in Washington DC in 1973. That was also the year when she first sang in Europe: she was highly acclaimed as Cherubino—her signature role—in celebrated productions by Giorgio Strehler in Paris and by Peter Hall at Glyndebourne. Soon she was singing in all of opera's most prestigious houses, appearing as Cherubino in Salzburg in 1974, as Rosina at Covent Garden in 1975, as Rosina at La Scala in 1976 and as Cherubino in Vienna in 1977. Her recording of Joseph Haydn's Harmoniemesse (taped under Leonard Bernstein in 1973) was the first item in what grew to be a large and eclectic discography, and a telecast of Le nozze di Figaro from Glyndebourne in 1973 launched her on a television career that eventually made her a familiar face on screens in America and across the world. The highlights of her performing life included singing in Washington DC for Presidents Nixon, Carter, Reagan and George H. W. Bush, starring in a gala staged in honour of the 1992 Winter Olympics and participating in a televised concert led by Leonard Slatkin to mourn those murdered in the terrorist atrocities of 9/11.

With a coltish physique and a warm, soft-grained, lyric mezzo-soprano voice that extended into soprano territory, she was a celebrated exponent of travesti roles like Hänsel, Idamante, and Octavian, and—aided by her striking beauty—she was also much admired playing leading ladies like Angelina, Charlotte, Dorabella, Lucette, Mélisande, Penelope and Zerlina. In the autumn of her career, she transitioned into character parts, among them Despina, Geschwitz, Tina, the Marquise de Merteuil, Mrs De Rocher, Madeline Mitchell, Winnie Flato and Myrtle Bledsoe. Her repertoire spanned the gamut from the baroque era through the classical and Romantic periods to modern music (including jazz and pop). Her many firsts included the US premiere of Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, the Met's first performance of Mozart's Idomeneo, the first recording of Massenet's Cendrillon and the world premieres of operas by Dominick Argento, Lembit Beecher, Ricky Ian Gordon, Jake Heggie, Thomas Pasatieri, Conrad Susa and Heitor Villa-Lobos. Her appearances in musicals by Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim reflected a love of musical theatre that had been kindled when she was a little girl listening to her mother's 78s of songs by George Gershwin and Jerome Kern.

Although she was primarily a singing actress, she was also a busy concert artist, particularly in the 1990s and 2000s. The composers whose orchestral pieces she programmed most often were Mozart, Mahler, Berlioz, Debussy, Ravel and Canteloube, who also featured prominently in her enormous recital repertoire, alongside Britten, Fauré, Handel, Offenbach, Poulenc, Schoenberg, Schubert, Schumann, Richard Strauss and the many American composers for whom she was an evangelist and, in several cases, a muse. French mélodies were particularly dear to her—a devoted Francophile, she became a fluent French speaker while still a teenager and made her home in Paris for several years during her early thirties. The pianist with whom she performed most often was Martin Katz. (Other colleagues who were especially important in her career were the composers Dominick Argento and Jake Heggie, the conductors Claudio Abbado, James Levine and Michael Tilson Thomas and the singers Kiri Te Kanawa, Marilyn Horne, Thomas Allen, Thomas Hampson, Richard Stilwell and Samuel Ramey.)

Von Stade ceased performing full time in 2010, but she continued to make occasional appearances near her East Bay home and elsewhere throughout the following decade and into the 2020s. Her activities in semi-retirement have included taking part in benefit concerts, judging singing competitions and teaching interpretation in master classes.

Personal life
Von Stade married Peter Elkus, a California-born bass-baritone and music teacher, in 1973. Their daughter Jenny (a clinical psychologist) was born in 1977, and their daughter Lisa (a technology company executive) in 1980. They divorced in 1990, and von Stade married Michael Gorman, an Alameda manufacturer and banker, shortly afterwards.

Von Stade is a practising Roman Catholic. Her extensive charitable work has involved her in a variety of programmes, most of them concerned with either education, health issues or homelessness. The main beneficiary of her philanthropy has been the Young Musicians Choral Orchestra, an East Bay organization that provides children from low income families with musical tuition, academic reinforcement and assistance in their personal development in order to help them to win a place at university.

Von Stade's many leisure activities include cooking, gardening, golf, sailing and ministering to a "West Highland terrorist" called Sadie.

Select discography

 * Argento: Casa Guidi, cond. Eiji Oue
 * Berlioz: La damnation de Faust, cond. Georg Solti
 * Berlioz and Debussy: Les nuits d'été and La damoiselle élue, cond. Seiji Ozawa
 * Bernstein: Arias and Barcarolles, cond. Michael Tilson Thomas
 * Bernstein: On the Town, cond. Michael Tilson Thomas
 * Chris Brubeck: Convergence, cond. Sara Jobin
 * Chris Brubeck and Dave Brubeck: Across Your Dreams
 * Canteloube: Chants d'Auvergne Vol. 1, cond. Antonio de Almeida
 * Canteloube: Chants d'Auvergne Vol. 2 and Triptyque, cond. Antonio de Almeida
 * Danielpour: Elegies, cond. Roger Nierenberg
 * Debussy: Mélodies, acc. Dalton Baldwin
 * Debussy: Pelléas et Mélisande, cond. Herbert von Karajann
 * De Falla: The Three-Cornered Hat, cond. André Previn
 * Fauré: Mélodies, acc. Jean-Philippe Collard
 * Fauré: L'œuvre d'orchestre, cond. Michel Plasson
 * Gordon: A Coffin in Egypt, cond. Timothy Myers
 * Joseph Haydn: La fedeltà premiata, cond. Antal Doráti
 * Joseph Haydn: Harmoniemesse, cond. Leonard Bernstein
 * Joseph Haydn: Il mondo della luna, cond. Antal Doráti
 * Heggie: Dead Man Walking (2000), cond. Patrick Summers
 * Heggie: Dead Man Walking (2011), cond. Patrick Summers
 * Heggie: The Faces of Love - The Songs of Jake Heggie, acc. Jake Heggie
 * Heggie: Flesh & Stone, acc. Jake Heggie
 * Heggie: Passing By - Songs by Jake Heggie, acc. Jake Heggie
 * Heggie: Three Decembers, cond. Patrick Summers
 * Humperdinck: Hänsel und Gretel, cond. John Pritchard
 * Kern: Show Boat, cond. John McGlinn
 * Mahler: Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Rückert Lieder and other songs, cond. Andrew Davis
 * Mahler: Symphony No. 4, cond. Claudio Abbado
 * Mahler: Symphony No. 4 and Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, cond. Yoel Levi
 * Massenet: Cendrillon, cond. Julius Rudel
 * Massenet: Chérubin, cond. Pinchas Steinberg
 * Massenet: Werther, cond. Colin Davis
 * Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night's Dream, cond. Eugene Ormandy
 * Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night's Dream, cond. Seiji Ozawa
 * Monteverdi: Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, cond. Raymond Leppard
 * Monteverdi and Cavalli: Frederica von Stade chante Monteverdi & Cavalli, cond. Raymond Leppard
 * Mozart: La clemenza di Tito, cond. Colin Davis
 * Mozart: Così fan tutte, cond. Alain Lombard
 * Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro, cond. Herbert von Karajan
 * Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro, cond. Georg Solti
 * Mozart: Waisenhausmesse, cond. Claudio Abbado
 * Mozart and Rossini: Mozart and Rossini Arias, cond. Edo de Waart
 * Offenbach: Arias and Overtures, cond. Antonio de Almeida
 * Porter: Anything Goes, cond. John McGlinn
 * Rameau: Dardanus, cond. Raymond Leppard
 * Ravel: Shéhérazade and other songs, cond. Seiji Ozawa
 * Rodgers and Hammerstein: The Sound of Music, cond. Erich Kunzel
 * Rodgers and Hart: My Funny Valentine, cond. John McGlinn
 * Rossini: Otello, cond. Jesús López-Cobos
 * Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier, cond. Edo de Waart
 * Thomas: Mignon, cond. Antonio de Almeida
 * Wilberg: Requiem and other works, cond. Craig Jessop
 * Various: Angel Heart, cond. Michael Morgan
 * Various: Flicka: Another Side of Frederica von Stade, cond. Jeremy Lubbock
 * Various: Frederica von Stade: French Opera Arias, cond. John Pritchard
 * Various: Frederica von Stade: Italian Opera Arias, cond. Mario Bernardi
 * Various: Frederica von Stade: Liederabend, acc. Martin Katz
 * Various: Frederica von Stade Live!, acc. Martin Katz
 * Various: Judith Blegen and Frederica von Stade: Songs, Arias and Duets, acc. Charles Wadsworth
 * Various: Marilyn Horne: Divas in Song, acc. various
 * Various: Marilyn Horne and Frederica von Stade: Lieder and Duets, acc. Martin Katz
 * Various: Opera Stars in Concert, cond. Anton Guadagno
 * Various: Pauline Viardot and Friends, acc. David Harper
 * Various: Puttin' on the Ritz, cond. Erich Kunzel
 * Various: A Salute to American Music, cond. James Conlon
 * Various: Simple Gifts / A Song of Thanksgiving, cond. Joseph Silverstein
 * Various: Song Recital, acc. Martin Katz
 * Various: Voyage à Paris: Frederica von Stade, acc. Martin Katz

Select videography

 * Bernstein: On the Town, Barbican Centre
 * Dvořák: Dvořák in Prague: A Celebration, Smetana Hall
 * Heggie: Great Scott, Dallas Opera
 * Humperdinck: Hänsel und Gretel, Metropolitan Opera
 * Mozart: Great Mass in C Minor, Waldsassen
 * Mozart: Idomeneo, Metropolitan Opera
 * Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro, Glyndebourne
 * Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro, Metropolitan Opera
 * Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro, Paris Opera
 * Rossini: La Cenerentola, La Scala
 * Rossini: The Rossini Bicentennial Birthday Gala, David Geffen Hall
 * Richard Strauss: Richard Strauss Gala, Berliner Philharmonie
 * Various: A Carnegie Hall Christmas Concert, Carnegie Hall
 * Various: Christmas with Flicka, St Wolfgang im Salzkammergut
 * Various: Christmas with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square, Salt Lake City Conference Center
 * Various: Glyndebourne Festival Opera: A Gala Evening, Glyndebourne
 * Various: James Levine's 25th Anniversary Metropolitan Opera Gala, Metropolitan Opera
 * Various: The Metropolitan Opera Centennial Gala, Metropolitan Opera
 * Various: The Metropolitan Opera Gala 1991, Metropolitan Opera

title: Frederica von Stade


text:
Ogof Craig a Ffynnon

Ogof Craig a Ffynnon (Welsh for "Cave [of the] Rock and Spring") is a cave in Wales. The cave is about 7 km in length and is located at the base of a quarried rockface in the Clydach Gorge. Water flowing out of the cave is a resurgence of water draining off Llangatock Mountain above.

History
The cave was discovered in 1976 by Jeff Hill, John Parker and Bill Gascoine, who had been searching for years for the way in to an underground system that they knew existed to account for the water that resurged in the locality, giving its name to the Rock and Fountain Inn on the road below. The entrance is at the bottom of a quarried rock face in the disused Daren Ddu Quarry, in the flanks of the Llangatock Mountain.

The cave
The cave is about 7 km in length and is renowned as one of the best-decorated caves in Wales. It contains some early short crawling sections (and what is known as an arduous and uncomfortable boulder choke) and some wet passages with voluminous quantities of mud before developing into a series of large sections lavishly decorated with mud and calcite formations. The most spectacular of these is the Hall of the Mountain King, a large cavern liberally adorned with flowstone. The Promised Land is a long, linear passage section with a small stream.

Beyond the well-decorated section the cave continues in a long series of low passages. It is thought that the cave will eventually be connected to the theoretical Llangattock System through Ogof y Daren Cilau. All the passages in Ogof Craig a Ffynnon occur in the Gilwern oolite which is located below the Llanelly Formation. The resurgences from the cave all occur in this oolite layer or the shales just above and there is evidence that there is much waterflow, from much of Mynydd Llangatwg, emerging in the Pwll y Cwm oolite, which is the resurgence for Ogof y Daren Cilau.

Access information
The cave can be approached from just above the old Rock and Fountain Inn on the Heads of the Valleys Road where there is a blocked layby beside some old lime kilns. An old tramroad track leads from here to the Darren Ddu Quarry. The entrance to the cave is at the foot of a rock face and is barred to prevent casual access and vandalism.

Since November 2004, access to the cave has been controlled by the Mynydd Llangatwg Cave Management and Advisory Committee; this means a key must be obtained to gain access through the gate, and the log book should be signed. Round trips to the "Hall of the Mountain King" take about two and a half hours while those to the "Promised Land" take six hours. There is a fixed ladder at the first boulder choke and climbing aids at the second boulder choke, but otherwise cavers need to provide their own tackle. The cave sometimes floods, with a sump forming beyond the first boulder choke.

title: Ogof Craig a Ffynnon


text:
Aralar

Aralar may refer to:
 * Aralar Range, a mountain range
 * Aralar (Basque political party), a political party

title: Aralar


text:
Steve Austria

Stephen Clement Austria (born October 12, 1958) is an American politician who served as a U.S. Representative for OH's 7th congressional district from 2009 to 2013. He is a member of the Republican Party. In December 2011, Austria announced his intention to not run for re-election for the 113th Congress in the 2012 elections. During his 14 years in elected office, Austria never lost an election.

Early life, education and career
Austria was born in Cincinnati, the son of Jean C. (née Brockman), a nurse, and the late Dr. Clement G. Austria, a medical doctor. He grew up in Xenia, the eldest of nine children. He graduated from Carroll High School in 1977. His mother was of German descent, and his father was from Tiaong, Quezon, Philippines, and had moved to Ohio to attend medical school. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Marquette University in 1982 and began a career as a financial advisor. The Austria family was named the 1984 "Ohio Family of the Year" and was later presented with one of nine "The Great American Family" awards by First Lady Nancy Reagan. His father sat on the Greene County Central Committee of the Republican Party.

Elections
Austria was a member of the Ohio House of Representatives from 1998 until 2000. Austria won re-election in 2004 against Democratic challenger Charlie Hart in the general election with 65% of the vote.

Tenure
Austria was elected to the Ohio State Senate in 2001, representing the 10th District. He served two terms as the Senate House Majority Whip. In 1998, he sponsored the "Internet Child Protection Act", which was later enacted into law.

Committee assignments
He served as Chairman of the Senate Highways and Transportation and Senate Judiciary Committees.

Elections
Austria won the Republican nomination for the 7th District after nine-term incumbent Dave Hobson retired. He defeated Democratic challenger Sharen Neuhardt in the general election, 59% to 41%. When Austria was elected, he made history by becoming the first son of a Filipino immigrant to be elected to the House of Representatives.
 * 2008

 * 2010

Austria was elected to a second term by defeating Libertarian John D. Anderson, Democrat Bill Conner and Constitution Party David Easton.

 * 2012

Following the 2010 United States Census, Ohio lost two seats in the House of Representatives, due to relatively slow population growth. In subsequent redistricting, Austria's district, which stretched from Springfield to the southern suburbs of Columbus, was dismantled, with its territory split between three neighboring districts. Austria's home in Beavercreek was drawn into the 10th District (previously the 3rd District) of fellow Republican Mike Turner, who has served since 2003. The largest city in the district, Springfield, was drawn into the 8th District of House Speaker John Boehner. In December 2011, Austria announced his intention to retire at the 2012 elections, rather than run in a primary against Turner or move to run in another district. While one proposal would have seen the 10th retain roughly half of the territory from Turner and Austria's old districts, the final map drew Austria into a district that would have been over 75 percent new to him. State House Majority Leader Matt Huffman said that the new map "essentially eliminated" any realistic chance of Austria being able to stay in Congress.

Tenure
Austria is the third person of Filipino heritage (after Bobby Scott of Virginia and John Ensign of Nevada ) to serve in the House as a voting member. He is the first first-generation Filipino to be elected to the United States Congress.

Austria is a staunch fiscal and social conservative, which is unusual in a district that has historically elected moderate Republicans. His campaign stressed Second Amendment rights, tax relief, opposition to abortion, and eliminating waste in government. He was a member of the Republican Study Committee and the Republican Main Street Partnership.

Austria co-wrote a letter with Rep. Steve Rothman in the wake of the Itamar attack claiming that any peace attempt in the Middle East had to recognize that "Palestinian incitement continues and there is almost no effort by them to promote coexistence and peace."

Committee assignments

 * Committee on Appropriations
 * Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies
 * Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies
 * Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs

Post-congressional career
Austria has a consulting business, and serves on an advisory board for the Republican National Committee and remains active in politics. As of 2014, Austria is on the Republican State Central Committee, representing the 10th District, and sits on the Republican National Committee's Asian American Advisory Council.

Personal life
Austria has lived in Beavercreek, a suburb of Dayton, for more than 20 years with his wife Eileen, and their three sons Brian, Kevin and Eric. Austria is a Catholic.

title: Steve Austria


text: User talk:12.23.54.10

title: User talk:12.23.54.10


text:
Alicia Markova

Dame Alicia Markova DBE (1 December 1910 – 2 December 2004) was a British ballerina and a choreographer, director and teacher of classical ballet. Most noted for her career with Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes and touring internationally, she was widely considered to be one of the greatest classical ballet dancers of the twentieth century. She was the first British dancer to become the principal dancer of a ballet company and, with Dame Margot Fonteyn, is one of only two English dancers to be recognised as a prima ballerina assoluta. Markova was a founder dancer of the Rambert Dance Company, The Royal Ballet and American Ballet Theatre, and was co-founder and director of the English National Ballet.

Early years
Markova was born as Lilian Alicia Marks on 1 December 1910. Her father, Arthur, was Jewish by birth; her mother, Eileen (nee Barry), converted to Judaism.

The family lived in a two bedroom flat in Finsbury Park.

Career
Markova began to dance on medical advice to strengthen her weak limbs. She made her stage debut at age ten, performing the role of Salome in the pantomime Dick Whittington and His Cat, for which she was billed as Little Alicia, the child Pavlova. She began studying ballet with Princess Serafina Astafieva, a Russian ballerina living in London. Astafieva was a retired dancer of the Ballets Russes, a renowned ballet company founded by the impresario Sergei Diaghilev. Astafieva established the Russian Dancing Academy at The Pheasantry, King's Road, Chelsea, and was responsible for teaching a number of notable British dancers including Margot Fonteyn and Anton Dolin. A blue plaque now marks the site of her former studio.

Diaghilev's Ballets Russes
At the age of 13, Markova was observed in class by Diaghilev, who was visiting London in search of new talent for his ballet company. He invited her to join the Ballets Russes in Monte Carlo, which she did in 1925, one month after her 14th birthday. Due to her age, she performed a number of roles which were specially choreographed for her, also performing in a varied repertoire of new and established ballets. Alongside the many notable dancers, during this period she encountered a number of leading 20th century figures who created work for the company including Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev, Léonide Massine, George Balanchine, and Bronislava Nijinska.

After Diaghilev
Following the death of Diaghilev in 1929, Markova returned to England, where she became the founder Principal Ballerina of The Ballet Club, a company founded by Dame Marie Rambert. During this period, she was particularly noted for performing works by Frederick Ashton, who was unknown at the time, but would go on to become one of Britain's most celebrated choreographers. The Ballet Club was to be the first professional ballet company in the United Kingdom, later becoming known as the Ballet Rambert. Now known as the Rambert Dance Company, it remains the oldest established dance company in the UK.

In 1931, Ninette de Valois founded the Vic-Wells Ballet in premises at Sadler's Wells theatre in London. A former colleague from Diaghilev's company, she invited Markova to join the company as one of its founder dancers, which she did, forming a famous partnership with Anton Dolin. De Valois hired Frederick Ashton, who became the resident choreographer and later Artistic Director of the company. In 1933, de Valois appointed Markova as the first Prima Ballerina of the company, which is now the internationally renowned Royal Ballet.

It was after seeing the Camargo Society performance of Giselle with Olga Spessivtseva and Dolin in 1932 that Markova first realized the possibilities of the then-neglected ballet. In time it became her most treasured role and the one whose expressive possibilities she continued to develop throughout her career. Her premiere in the role was on New Year's Day 1934 at the Vic.

In 1935, Markova and Dolin left the Vic-Wells ballet to form their own touring company known as the Markova-Dolin Company. The company toured extensively for two seasons and in 1936 Prince Wolkonsky joined the company as ballet master. Later in 1938 Markova joined the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, touring the world as the company's star ballerina. The company was the first to tour ballet throughout the United States, taking the art form to audiences who had never seen ballet before. During this time, she was a key figure in the formation of the American Ballet Theatre, dancing with the company during its early years.

Markova appeared in ballets around the world, but is remembered mostly for her Giselle, as well as for The Dying Swan and Les Sylphides. During the Second World War she re-formed Les Ballets Russes in the United States and appeared as a dancer with Dolin in the Hollywood film, A Song for Miss Julie.

English National Ballet
In 1950, Markova and Dolin became the co-founders of the Festival Ballet, a company formed to celebrate the imminent Festival of Britain and backed by the Polish businessman Julian Brunsweg. Dolin was to be the company's first Artistic Director, with Markova as Prima Ballerina. The company was formed to tour ballets to audiences that would otherwise be unable to experience ballet, and went on to tour extensively to less conventional venues both in the United Kingdom and internationally. It also established a number of educational programmes designed to make ballet accessible to new audiences. She remained the Prima ballerina until 1952, after which she continued to appear regularly as a guest dancer until her retirement from professional dancing.

In 1960, she collaborated with Indian classical dancer Ram Gopal to create a duet "Radha-Krishna" based on Hindu mythology, in which she danced as Radha, while he danced as Krishna. Today their collaboration is commemorated at the National Portrait Gallery, London where her bronze bust stands next to his portrait. In 1989, the Festival Ballet was renamed English National Ballet to reflect the company's role as Britain's only classical ballet company dedicated to touring ballets nationwide at an affordable price for audiences.

Retirement

Markova retired from professional dancing in January 1963 at the age of 52. Following her retirement, she continued to play an active role in the ballet and theatre industry as a teacher, director and choreographer. She was responsible for staging a number of ballets that she had performed with the Ballets Russes, also coaching dancers for roles she had created for choreographers such as Sir Frederick Ashton.

As a teacher she presented televised master classes and was also appointed Professor of Ballet and Performing Arts at the University of Cincinnati. In her later years, she continued to be a regular member of the teaching faculty for residential ballet courses such as the Yorkshire Ballet Seminars and the Abingdon Ballet Seminars, and was also President and a regular guest teacher at the Arts Educational Schools in London and Tring. She was also a governor and regular guest teacher at the Royal Ballet School.

She was the subject of This Is Your Life on two occasions, in January 1960 when she was surprised by Eamonn Andrews at the Royal Festival Hall, and in October 1995, when Michael Aspel surprised her at London's Royal Opera House. Markova was Patron/President of numerous dance organisations, including serving as President of English National Ballet, a Governor of The Royal Ballet and vice President of the Royal Academy of Dance.

Death
Some time after suffering a stroke, Markova died on 2 December 2004 in a hospital in Bath, one day after her 94th birthday. She never married. A funeral service was held at Bath's Haycombe Crematorium. A memorial service of thanksgiving for her life and work was held at Westminster Abbey on 8 March 2005.

As part of the service, dancers of the English National Ballet company performed extracts from the ballet Giselle (Daria Klimentová, Dmitri Gruzdyev, Erina Takahashi, Arionel Vargas) and Les Sylphides (Agnes Oakes and Simone Clarke).

Awards and honours

 * 1957 - Dance Magazine Award
 * 1957 - Woman of the Year Award (American Women's Organisation)
 * 1958 - CBE, Commander of the Order of the British Empire
 * 1963 - DBE, Dame Commander of Order of the British Empire
 * 1963 - Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Award, Royal Academy of Dance
 * 1966 - DMus, Honorary Doctorate of Music, Leicester University
 * 1982 - MusD, Honorary Doctorate of Music, University of East Anglia
 * 1994 - Evening Standard Special Award
 * 2000 - Cecchetti D'Argento Award, Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing
 * 2001 - DUniv, Honorary Doctor of the University, Middlesex University

Positions

 * Co-Founder and President, English National Ballet
 * Governor, The Royal Ballet
 * Vice President, Royal Academy of Dance
 * President, The London Ballet Circle
 * Patron, The Academy of Indian Dance
 * President, All England Dance Association
 * President, The Arts Educational Schools
 * President, British Ballet Organization

 * Professor of Ballet and Performing Arts, College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati
 * Patron, Friends of Northern Ballet Theatre
 * Patron, Abingdon Ballet Seminars
 * Honorary President, ANCEC (Associazione Nationale Coreutica Enrico Cecchetti)
 * Patron, Critics' Circle National Dance Awards
 * Director, Metropolitan Opera Ballet 1963–69

title: Alicia Markova


text:
Jim Jordan

James Daniel Jordan (born February 17, 1964) is an American politician currently serving in his ninth term in the U.S. House of Representatives as the representative for OH's 4th congressional district since 2007. He is a member of the Republican Party.

Jordan is a two-time NCAA national champion wrestler and a former college wrestling coach. In Congress, Jordan helped start the right-wing populist House Freedom Caucus, serving as its first chair from 2015 to 2017, and as its vice chair since 2017. Jordan was a prominent critic of Speaker of the House John Boehner, who resigned under Freedom Caucus pressure in 2015. He was the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee from 2019 to 2020, when he left to become the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, of which he became chair in 2023.

Jordan is a close ally of former president Donald Trump. During Trump's presidency, Jordan sought to discredit investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election and staged a sit-in to prevent a Trump impeachment inquiry hearing over the Trump–Zelenskyy telephone controversy. After Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election and Trump tried to overturn the election, Jordan supported lawsuits to challenge the election results and voted not to certify the Electoral College results. He refused to cooperate with the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, which subpoenaed him on May 12, 2022.

Jordan, who opposed Kevin McCarthy during his failed bid to succeed Boehner as speaker in 2015, later become one of McCarthy's closest allies; Jordan supported McCarthy during the January 2023 Speaker of the House election. After McCarthy was removed as speaker, Jordan stood in the October 2023 election to replace him. He became the second nominee of the House Republican Conference after Steve Scalise withdrew, but failed to win the speakership in three rounds of voting and had his nomination revoked.

Early life and education
Jordan was born in Troy, Ohio, the son of Shirley and John Jordan, and raised in Champaign County, Ohio. He attended and wrestled for Graham High School, graduating in 1982. He won state championships all four years he was in high school and compiled a 156–1 win–loss record. He then enrolled at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he became a two-time NCAA Division I wrestling champion. Jordan won the 1985 and 1986 NCAA championship matches in the 134 lb weight class, defeating future multi time World and Olympic champion John Smith in the former. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in economics in 1986. He lost the 57 – featherweight semifinal match at the 1988 US Olympic wrestling trials against Smith, failing to qualify for the Olympic team in freestyle wrestling.

Jordan earned a master's degree in education from Ohio State University and received a Juris Doctor degree from the Capital University Law School in 2001. In a 2018 interview, Jordan said he never took the bar examination.

Ohio State wrestling assistant coach during team's abuse scandal
Jordan was an assistant coach with Ohio State University's wrestling program from 1987 to 1995.

Richard Strauss was the wrestling team physician during Jordan's tenure. Strauss died by suicide in 2005. In April 2018, Ohio State University began an independent investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct by Strauss. The report concluded that Strauss had committed sexual abuse against 177 student-patients. The majority of abuse (143 victims) was categorized as genital fondling associated with medically unnecessary genital or rectal examinations. Of the 177, 153 were student-athletes, of which a plurality (48) were members of the men's wrestling team.

Several involved persons have stated that Jordan surely knew of Strauss's criminal misconduct but did not report it. A spokesperson for Jordan denied the allegation, saying that "chairman Jordan never saw or heard of any abuse, and if he had, he would have dealt with it". No wrestlers have accused Jordan himself of sexual misconduct, but four former wrestlers named him as a defendant in a lawsuit against the university. Jordan has denied any wrongdoing, has refused to cooperate with investigations into Strauss, and has described his accusers as "pawns in a political plot".

Ohio General Assembly
Jordan was elected to the Ohio House of Representatives in November 1994 and represented the 85th Ohio House district for three terms.

In 2000, Jordan was elected to the Ohio Senate over independent candidate Jack Kaffenberger with 88% of the vote. In 2004, Jordan defeated Kaffenberger again, with 79% of the vote.

Elections
Jordan represents Ohio's 4th congressional district, a primarily urban district, which includes Lima, Mansfield, Marysville, and Marion, and parts of Columbus.

Jordan first ran for Congress in 2006, where he won the Republican primary for the 4th district after 26-year incumbent Mike Oxley announced his retirement. Jordan defeated Democratic nominee Rick Siferd in the general election with 60% of the vote.

Jordan was reelected in 2008, defeating Democratic nominee Mike Carroll with 65% of the vote. In 2010, he was again reelected, defeating Democrat Doug Litt and Libertarian Donald Kissick with 71% of the vote. Jordan was reelected in 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2022.

Tenure
Jordan chaired the Republican Study Committee during the 112th Congress, while turning down a position on the Appropriations Committee. During the 2013 US government shutdown, he was described by Rolling Stone as the committee's most powerful member. That group was the primary proponent and executor of the Republican congressional strategy to bring about a government shutdown in order to force changes in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.

Jordan received a vote for Speaker of the United States House of Representatives in the 113th Congress from a fellow right-wing conservative, Tea Party Caucus chairman Tim Huelskamp. Jordan received two votes for Speaker during the 114th Congress. On July 26, 2018, he announced his bid for Speaker after Paul Ryan retired; his campaign ended when Democrats took the majority in the House. Subsequently, Jordan campaigned for House minority leader. Former Ohio state representative Capri Cafaro said that Jordan "is someone who has built a reputation as an attack dog, someone who is media savvy, someone who is a stalwart supporter of the president and who has the skill necessary to take the lead for the GOP". He lost his bid to Kevin McCarthy in a 159–43 vote. In 2023, Jordan returned to consideration for the speakership after McCarthy failed to win it after three rounds of voting.

Jordan was the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee from January 2019 to June 2020, with a brief interlude in March 2020. He was replaced by James Comer.

Jordan's district has been redrawn over time to minimize urban area (such as Toledo, Columbus or Cleveland) and increase rural area; it now stretches from Lake Erie nearly to Dayton. In May 2019, a three-judge federal panel ruled Ohio's congressional district map unconstitutional due to partisan gerrymandering and ordered Ohio to create a new map in time for the 2020 election. But after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Rucho v. Common Cause that courts could not review allegations of gerrymandering, the district boundaries were not to change until maps were redrawn in 2022.

In December 2021, the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack released the partial contents of a text message an unnamed lawmaker sent to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows before the scheduled final certification of presidential electors on January 6, 2021. The excerpt read: "On January 6, 2021, Vice President Mike Pence, as President of the Senate, should call out all the electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional as no electoral votes at all." The day after the release, Jordan acknowledged sending the message, but said he had merely forwarded it after receiving it from attorney Joseph Schmitz. Both Jordan and Meadows asserted that the committee had altered the context of the excerpt by misplacing a period.

Freedom Caucus
During the 114th Congress, Jordan and eight other members of Congress founded the House Freedom Caucus, a bloc of conservatives working "to advance an agenda of limited constitutional government" in Congress. He served as the group's first chair. The caucus was ultimately credited with pushing Speaker John Boehner into retirement.

Legislation
As of 2023, Jordan, who has served in the House of Representatives for over 16 years, has never sponsored a bill that later became law.

On May 2, 2014, Jordan introduced House Resolution 565, "Calling on Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr., to appoint a special counsel to investigate the targeting of conservative nonprofit groups by the Internal Revenue Service". It passed on May 7, 2014. Holder, who had previously been found to be in contempt of Congress, failed to appoint a special counsel to investigate the alleged procedural abuses of IRS employees, including Lois Lerner.

In March 2017, Jordan criticized the newly introduced American Health Care Act, the Republican replacement bill for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, calling it an unacceptable form of "Obamacare Lite". On May 4, 2017, he voted to pass a revised version of the legislation.

On June 13, 2018, Jordan and Representative Mark Meadows filed a resolution to compel the Department of Justice to provide certain documents to Congress relating to the ongoing congressional investigations of Russian interference in the 2016 election. The resolution asserted that the DOJ was stonewalling congressional oversight and sought to give the DOJ seven days from its enactment to turn over documents related to both Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller as well as various decisions made by the FBI during the 2016 presidential election. Jordan issued a press release that stated: "This resolution gives the DOJ seven days to turn over the documents that they owe Congress. Rod Rosenstein threatened congressional staff. When the bully picks on your little brother, you have to respond. It's time for House Leadership to stand up and pass this resolution."

On July 25, 2018, Jordan and Meadows introduced articles of impeachment against Rosenstein, whom they accused of "intentionally withholding embarrassing documents and information, knowingly hiding material investigative information from Congress, various abuses of the FISA process, and failure to comply with congressional subpoenas". Jordan stated that impeachment was necessary because: "The DOJ is keeping information from Congress. Enough is enough. It's time to hold Mr. Rosenstein accountable for blocking Congress's constitutional oversight role."

Jordan and Representative Warren Davidson were the only members of Ohio's congressional delegation and two of 60 members of Congress to vote in October 2019 against a bipartisan resolution that passed the House 354–60 condemning Trump's unilateral withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Syria.

Speaker elections
Despite his support for Kevin McCarthy in the 2023 Speaker of the House of Representatives election, including nominating McCarthy on the second ballot, Jordan was nominated on the second ballot by Representative Matt Gaetz. He received 19 votes, enough to deny McCarthy the speakership in the second round. Jordan was nominated again on the third ballot by Chip Roy. He won 20 votes in the third ballot, with Byron Donalds switching from McCarthy to Jordan. This was enough to necessitate a fourth ballot, but Jordan got no votes on ballots 4 through 11, as all his supporters switched to Donalds. On the 12th ballot, Gaetz nominated Jordan again. He received four votes, enough to necessitate a 13th ballot when combined with the three for Kevin Hern. He was not nominated on the 13th or 14th ballot, but received six and two votes on each, respectively.

After the House removed McCarthy from the speakership on October 3, 2023, Jordan launched a bid for the speakership. His speakership bid was endorsed by Donald Trump. On October 11, Jordan was defeated by Steve Scalise for the Republican nomination for the speakership. However, after Scalise withdrew a day later after failing to consolidate the necessary votes, Jordan launched a second bid for the speakership and defeated Austin Scott for the Republican nomination. Jordan subsequently failed to win the speakership in the first two rounds of the House vote, garnering only 200 of the 217 votes needed to win in the first vote and only 199 votes in the second. A third round of voting occurred on October 20, 2023, where he garnered only 194 votes of the 217 votes needed to win in the third round. Following his third defeat, Jordan intended to continue his bid for the speakership however he was subsequently removed from his position as Speaker-designate by his Republican colleagues in a secret ballot.

Committee assignments

 * Committee on the Judiciary (chairman)
 * Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government (chairman)
 * Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
 * Subcommittee on Health Care, Benefits, and Administrative Rules
 * Subcommittee on Government Operations
 * Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis
 * House Select Committee on the Events Surrounding the 2012 Terrorist Attack in Benghazi (2014–2016)
 * Committee on Intelligence (temporary)

Caucus memberships

 * Freedom Caucus
 * Congressional Constitution Caucus
 * Congressional Western Caucus
 * U.S.-Japan Caucus
 * Campus Free Speech Caucus

Political positions
According to The Dayton Daily News, Jordan "is known for being one of Congress' most conservative members".

Jordan has earned a perfect score from the American Conservative Union. He has voted consistently for anti-abortion legislation and was endorsed by Ohio Right to Life in 2012. During the 112th Congress, he was one of 40 "staunch" members of the Republican Study Committee who frequently voted against Republican party leadership and vocally expressed displeasure with House bills.

Jordan was a leading critic of President Barack Obama's Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) program, advocating for its shutdown.

Jordan has supported the continued production and upgrades of M1 Abrams tanks in his district.

Jordan, along with all other Senate and House Republicans, voted against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.

Donald Trump
Jordan has been a stalwart supporter and close ally of Trump. Asked by Anderson Cooper in April 2018 whether he had ever heard Trump tell a lie, Jordan said "I have not" and "nothing comes to mind". He also said, "I don't know that [Trump has ever] said something wrong that he needs to apologize for."

In December 2017, Jordan sought to discredit the FBI and Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. He questioned Mueller's impartiality, and called on Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein to use his authority to disband Mueller's investigation or create a second special counsel to simultaneously investigate Mueller himself. Rosenstein rejected the request, saying that he could not appoint another special counsel as there was no credible allegation of a potential crime. The New York Times reported that Republicans were increasingly criticizing Mueller's investigation after it "delivered a series of indictments to high-profile associates of the president and evidence that at least two of them are cooperating with the inquiry".

In July 2018, Jordan led efforts to impeach Rosenstein as a way to shut down Mueller's investigation. During a hearing on July 12, 2018, Jordan repeatedly interrupted FBI agent Peter Strzok while Strzok tried to explain that he couldn't answer specific questions to preserve the confidentiality of an ongoing investigation. Democrats protested Jordan's behavior and urged their fellow representatives to allow Strzok to respond. They also objected to Jordan's exceeding his allowed time for questioning. House Judiciary Committee chairman Bob Goodlatte admonished Jordan for his repeated interruptions of the witness.

In July 2018, Jordan and Mark Meadows called on the Department of Justice to "review allegations that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein threatened to subpoena phone records and documents from a House Intelligence Committee staffer". In their written request, the two wrote that in his use of investigative powers, Rosenstein had retaliated "against rank-and-file (congressional) staff members", thereby abusing his authority. To John Catsimatidis on WNYM, Jordan said he would force a vote on Rosenstein's impeachment if the DOJ did not deliver documents Congress requested.

In March 2019, House Judiciary chair Jerrold Nadler criticized Jordan for allegedly using anti-Semitic messaging by spelling the name of the 2020 presidential candidate Tom Steyer, whose father is Jewish, with a "$" in place of an "S" on Twitter, while urging Nadler to resist calls for Trump's impeachment.

During Mueller's testimony to two congressional committees on July 24, 2019, Jordan asked Mueller why he never charged Joseph Mifsud with lying to the FBI while George Papadopoulos was charged for lying about Mifsud. Jordan said: "Mifsud is the guy who told Papadopoulos [about Russian dirt]. He was the guy who started it all. Yet when the FBI interviews him, he lies three times; you don't charge him." Mueller responded, "Well, I can't get into it and it's obvious, I think, that we can't get into charging decisions."

On October 23, 2019, Jordan and two dozen other Republicans staged a protest that delayed a Trump impeachment inquiry hearing. The coordinated action disrupted the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence where Republican and Democratic congressional members planned to take testimony from Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Laura Cooper. The group staged a sit-in outside the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) hearing room. Some of the Republicans who participated already had access to the hearings since the members of the House Oversight, Intelligence and Foreign Affairs committees were welcome to attend and ask questions. Describing the sit-in, Jordan said, "The members have just had it, and they want to be able to see and represent their constituents and find out what's going on." The next day, he said on Fox News, "Adam Schiff is doing this unfair, partisan process in secret and our members finally said, 'Enough'... We're so frustrated. They reached a boiling point and these guys marched in and said 'we want to know what's going on.'"

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson wrote to the House sergeant-at-arms about Jordan, Representative Bradley Byrne, and others, requesting that he take action regarding their "unprecedented breach of security". Senator Lindsey Graham admonished his House colleagues for their tactic, calling them "nuts" for having made a "run on the SCIF".

As the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, during a July 2020 hearing with Attorney General Bill Barr, Jordan presented a video montage that, according to CNN host Jake Tapper, took statements by CNN reporters out of context to create the impression they were characterizing violent protests as "mostly peaceful".

In December 2020, Jordan was one of 126 Republican members of the House of Representatives to sign an amicus brief in support of Texas v. Pennsylvania, a lawsuit filed at the United States Supreme Court contesting the results of the 2020 presidential election, in which Joe Biden defeated Trump. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case on the basis that Texas lacked standing under Article III of the Constitution to challenge the results of an election held by another state. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a statement that called signing the amicus brief an act of "election subversion" and an attempt to "subvert the Constitution and undermine public trust in our sacred democratic institutions." New Jersey Representative Bill Pascrell, citing section three of the 14th Amendment, called for Pelosi to not seat Jordan and other amicus brief signers, arguing that they had tried to "overturn a democratic election and install a dictator", while "the 14th Amendment expressly forbids Members of Congress from engaging in rebellion against the United States".

When the Supreme Court in October 2020 permitted counting Pennsylvania mail-in ballots collected three days after the 2020 election, Jordan declared: "Democrats are trying to steal the election, after the election." In December 2020, Jordan said: "I don't know how you can ever convince me that President Trump didn't actually win this" 2020 election. On January 5, 2021, Jordan alleged: "There was fraud on top of the unconstitutional way they ran the election [with pandemic voting laws] … they added fraud on top of it … And that's why President Trump wasn't elected president". On January 12, 2021, Jordan claimed: "I've never said that this election was stolen".

On January 6–7, 2021, Jordan cast a vote to prevent the certification of the Electoral College in at least one state. He was one of the 139 representatives who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in Congress on January 7, 2021, the day after the storming of the Capitol. At a later virtual committee meeting, Jordan said the storming of the Capitol "was as wrong as wrong can be".

On January 11, 2021, Trump awarded Jordan the Presidential Medal of Freedom in a closed-door ceremony.

Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, testified before the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack that Jordan had talked to the White House about presidential pardons for Republican members of Congress who participated in attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election.

Antitrust and tech policy
Jordan has critiqued "Big Tech" companies, though he opposes proposals to break up these companies through antitrust enforcement.

Google has contributed money to his political campaign since 2012, including $10,000 in 2020. Tucker Carlson criticized Jordan for accepting donations from Google.

In 2023, Jordan refused to make Ken Buck the chairman of the Subcommittee on Antitrust, despite Buck being the most senior Republican on the committee and a proponent of antitrust enforcement. Conservatives criticized Jordan for this decision.

Disinformation research
As chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Jordan is heading a legal campaign against researchers at universities, think tanks and private companies that study disinformation. Those affected include the Stanford Internet Observatory at Stanford University, the University of Washington, the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab and the social media analytics firm Graphika. Since January 2023, when Republicans gained a majority in the House, the House Judiciary Committee has sent letters, subpoenas, and threats of legal action to researchers, demanding notes, emails and other records from researchers and even student interns, dating back to 2015.

Projects affected include the Election Integrity Partnership, formed to identify attempts "to suppress voting, reduce participation, confuse voters or delegitimize election results without evidence" and the Virality Project, which has examined the spread of false claims about vaccines. Jordan claims that such organizations worked with the government to censor conservative speech online. Although research groups may have reported problematic content, "no evidence has emerged that government officials coerced the companies to take action against accounts". Researchers argue that they have academic freedom to study social media and disinformation as well as freedom of speech to report their results.

Previous research has indicated that sharing of disinformation and propaganda within the United States has been associated with the development of increasingly "partisan" media, appearing most strongly in right-wing sources such as Breitbart, The Daily Caller, and Fox News. The actions of Jordan and the House Judiciary Committee have been described as an "attempt to chill research," creating a "chilling effect" through increased time demands, legal costs and online harassment of researchers.

Health care and drug policy
Jordan opposes the Affordable Care Act, calling for it to be repealed. He opposes vaccine requirements, describing them as "un-American".

Since coming into office, Jordan has voted in opposition to efforts to liberalize federal marijuana policy. Jordan supports the permanent classification of "fentanyl-related substances" as Schedule I drugs under the Controlled Substances Act. In 2017, Jordan argued that "the most beneficial things can be done at a local level" in responding to the opioid epidemic.

Environment
In July 2008, Jordan was the first member of Congress to sign the "No Climate Tax" pledge drafted by the conservative political advocacy group Americans for Prosperity.

In Congress, Jordan voted to open the Outer Continental Shelf to oil drilling, prevent the EPA from regulating greenhouse gases, and bar greenhouse gases from Clean Air Act rules. He voted against enforcing limits on carbon dioxide global warming pollution, tax credits for renewable electricity, tax incentives for renewable energy and energy conservation, and curtailing subsidies for oil and gas company exploration.

Abortion
Jordan opposes abortion, and supports banning federal funding to Planned Parenthood.

On July 12, 2022, Jordan tweeted to The Washington Examiner that a report of a 10-year-old Ohio girl traveling to Indiana to obtain a legal abortion after being raped was a lie. He deleted the tweet on July 13 after the rapist was arrested by police and confessed to raping the girl twice, and police confirmed that the report of her abortion in Indiana was accurate.

Taxes
While serving in the Ohio Senate, Jordan supported the Tax and Expenditure Limitation Amendment, a state constitutional amendment that would require a vote of the people to raise taxes or increase spending over certain limits.

Foreign policy
Jordan was among 60 Republicans to oppose condemning Trump's action of withdrawing forces from Syria. According to The American Conservative, along with Matt Gaetz and a handful of Republicans, he broke with the party and voted to end Saudi assistance to the war in Yemen.

In June 2021, Jordan was one of 49 House Republicans to vote to repeal the AUMF against Iraq. In 2023, Jordan was among 47 Republicans to vote in favor of H.Con.Res. 21 which directed President Joe Biden to remove U.S. troops from Syria within 180 days.

Since the onset of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Jordan has reportedly voted in opposition to almost all bills to provide military assistance to Ukraine.

Jordan endorsed providing aid to Israel in the wake of the 2023 Israel–Hamas war.

LGBT rights
In 2015, Jordan cosponsored a resolution to amend the US constitution to ban same-sex marriage. Jordan condemned the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which held that same-sex marriage bans violated the Constitution.

Veterans
The PACT ACT which expanded VA benefits to veterans exposed to toxic chemicals during their military service, received a "nay" from Jordan. Regarding cannabis, despite lobbying from VSOs such as the DAV, Jordan also voted against the 2016 Veterans Equal Access Amendment.

COVID-19
Jordan supported protests in April 2020 that opposed government lockdowns intended to curb the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Jordan opposes vaccine mandates, calling them "un-American". Jordan criticized Anthony Fauci during congressional hearings over his pandemic policy recommendations, and in 2021 called on Fauci to resign. In December 2021, when the mortality toll from COVID-19 in the United States averaged 1,659 deaths per day, Jordan declared that "Real America is done with COVID-19. The only people who don't understand that are Fauci and Biden." In 2023, Jordan invited anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to testify before Congress about alleged censorship of his opinions on social media. Jordan defended a tweet by Kennedy which implied that Hank Aaron, who died in 2021 of natural causes, had passed away due to Aaron being administered the COVID-19 vaccine. Jordan said Kennedy's tweet was not "factually inaccurate. Hank Aaron, real person, great American, passed away after he got the vaccine. Pointing out, just pointing out facts."

Personal life
Jordan and his wife, Polly, live near Urbana, Ohio, in central Champaign County. They were introduced by her brothers, with whom Jordan competed in wrestling. Polly and Jordan started dating when he was 13 and she was 14. They have four children and two grandchildren. Jordan's son-in-law, Jarrod Uthoff, is a professional basketball player.

Political campaigns
U.S. House of Representatives, Ohio 4th District

2008 – defeated Mike Carroll. 2010 – defeated Doug Litt (D) and Donald Kissick (L). 2012 – defeated Jim Slone (D) and Chris Kalla (L). 2014 – defeated Janet Garrett (D). 2016 – defeated Janet Garrett (D). 2018 – defeated Janet Garrett (D). 2020 – defeated Shannon Freshour (D) and Steve Perkins (L).

title: Jim Jordan