Jim Webb Bio
James Henry Webb Jr. (born February 9, 1946) is an American politician, author, journalist, filmmaker, and former Marine Corps officer. He served as a United States Senator from Virginia from 2007 to 2013, representing the Democratic Party after switching from the Republican Party in 2006. Earlier in his public career, Webb served as Secretary of the Navy and as the nation’s first Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs during the Reagan administration. A decorated Vietnam veteran awarded the Navy Cross, he has also taught literature at the U.S. Naval Academy and worked as a Fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics.
Webb is the author of ten books, including the novel Fields of Fire and the history Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America, and he wrote the story for the 2000 film Rules of Engagement. He briefly sought the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination before stepping aside. In 2020, the University of Notre Dame named him the first distinguished fellow of its International Security Center.
Jim Webb Early Life and Background
Early Life and Background
James Henry Webb Jr. was born on February 9, 1946, in St. Joseph, Missouri, to James Henry Webb and his wife, Vera Lorraine (Hodges). The older son and second of four children, he grew up in a military family that moved frequently as his father’s career in the United States Air Force required. The family lived in Missouri, Illinois, Texas, Alabama, Nebraska, California, and Virginia, and also spent time in England, where his father served as an exchange officer with the Royal Air Force. His father flew B-17s and B-29s during World War II, participated in the 1948-49 Berlin airlift, and later pioneered work in the Air Force missile program at Vandenberg Air Force Base. Webb’s parents are buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Webb is descended from Scots-Irish immigrants from Ulster who came to the British North American colonies in the mid-18th century, a heritage he explored in his 2004 book Born Fighting. Because of his family’s many moves, he attended more than a dozen schools across the United States and in England. After graduating from high school in Bellevue, Nebraska, he attended the University of Southern California on a Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps scholarship from 1963 to 1964. In 1964, he earned an appointment to the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, where he served on the Brigade Honor Committee and Brigade Staff and received the Superintendent’s Letter for Outstanding Leadership upon graduating in 1968.
Path to US Politics
After his medical retirement from the Marine Corps, Webb enrolled at Georgetown University Law Center, graduating in 1975 with a Juris Doctor and receiving the Horan Award for excellence in legal writing. He worked on the staff of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs from 1977 to 1981, while also representing veterans pro bono. He attended the 1980 Republican National Convention in Detroit, where he led the Pledge of Allegiance in the opening session. These experiences in government service, law, and veterans’ affairs gave him a foundation in public policy that he would draw on for decades.
Webb’s first move into senior national office came during the Reagan administration, when he served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs from 1984 to 1987. In 1987, he was named Secretary of the Navy, becoming the first Naval Academy graduate to serve as the civilian head of the Navy. He resigned in 1988 after refusing to agree to reductions in the size of the fleet. His career in defense policy, military affairs, and writing positioned him for a leap into electoral politics with the 2006 Senate race in Virginia.
Jim Webb Career
Early Career (1968-1988)
Webb’s first career was as a Marine Corps officer. After graduating from the Naval Academy in 1968, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant and completed Officer Basic School at the top of his class. He was promoted to first lieutenant during his first tour in Vietnam, where he served as a platoon commander with Delta Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Marines. He received the Navy Cross, the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and two Purple Hearts for his combat service. His war wounds left him with shrapnel in his knee, kidney, and head, and a medical board recommended his medical retirement.
After returning from Vietnam, Webb was assigned to Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, as an instructor for Officer Candidates School, and then worked in the Secretary of the Navy’s office. Following law school, he joined the staff of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs and taught at the Naval Academy, where a 1979 Washingtonian magazine article, "Women Can’t Fight," later became a campaign issue. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan appointed him Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs, and in 1987, he became Secretary of the Navy, a position he held until his 1988 resignation.
2006 Senate Campaign Breakthrough (2006)
In late 2005, a grassroots campaign to draft Webb for the U.S. Senate began online, and on February 7, 2006, he announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination to challenge Republican incumbent George Allen of Virginia. He won the Democratic primary on June 13, 2006, with 53.5 percent of the vote, defeating businessman Harris Miller. His entry into the race transformed the contest, and political analyst Larry Sabato called Webb "George Allen’s worst nightmare: a war hero and a Reagan appointee who holds moderate positions."
An August 2006 incident in which Allen used the word "macaca" toward a Webb campaign tracker helped shift public opinion, and Webb gained ten percentage points in a single week. On September 7, 2006, Webb released a television advertisement featuring a 1985 Ronald Reagan speech praising his Marine service, drawing objection from Nancy Reagan and the Reagan Library. On November 9, 2006, after the Associated Press and Reuters projected Webb as the winner by less than half of one percent of the vote, Allen conceded, and Webb became the first Democratic U.S. senator elected in Virginia since 1994.
U.S. Senate Era (2007-2013)
Webb was sworn in to the 110th Congress on January 3, 2007, and was assigned to the Foreign Relations, Veterans’ Affairs, and Armed Services committees. On his first day, he introduced the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act, which he had written, to expand educational benefits for service members and their families. The bill became law on June 30, 2008, as part of the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2008. On January 23, 2007, he delivered the Democratic response to President George W. Bush’s State of the Union address, focusing on economic inequality and the war in Iraq.
On March 5, 2007, Webb introduced legislation to prohibit the use of funds for military operations in Iran without prior congressional approval. He also filed the Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009 to create a blue-ribbon commission to re-examine incarceration and drug policy, and the bill passed the Senate Judiciary Committee by voice vote in January 2010. On August 14, 2009, he visited Myanmar, meeting both the ruling junta’s leader, General Than Shwe, and the pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and helped secure the release of an imprisoned American. On February 9, 2011, Webb announced he would not run for re-election in 2012.
2016 Presidential Campaign and Post-Senate Work (2014-Present)
On November 19, 2014, Webb announced the formation of an exploratory committee for a possible 2016 presidential bid, and on July 2, 2015, he formally entered the race for the Democratic nomination. After struggling to gain traction, he ended his campaign on October 20, 2015, and ruled out an independent run on February 11, 2016. In 2020, the University of Notre Dame named him the first distinguished fellow of its International Security Center. He has continued to write, lecture, and speak on national security, veterans’ affairs, and U.S. policy in Asia.
Notable Events and Milestones
Webb’s military awards include the Navy Cross, the second-highest decoration in the Navy and Marine Corps, for actions on July 10, 1969, in Vietnam. As Secretary of the Navy, he became the first Naval Academy graduate to lead the Navy as a civilian. His 2006 Senate victory, by a margin of less than half of one percent, made him the first Democrat to win a Virginia Senate seat in twelve years, and the Post-9/11 GI Bill he authored became one of the most significant veterans’ education laws in modern American history.
Jim Webb Family
Family Background and Public Service Lineage
Webb’s father, James Henry Webb, had a long Air Force career, flying heavy bombers in World War II and cargo planes in the Berlin airlift before pioneering work in the Air Force missile program. His mother, Vera Lorraine (Hodges), raised a military family that moved often and that Webb has described in his writing on the Scots-Irish experience in America. Both parents are buried at Arlington National Cemetery, reflecting a family tradition of service that Webb has often cited as formative.
Personal Life
Webb married Barbara Samorajczyk in 1968; they had one daughter, Amy, and divorced in 1979. He married Assistant Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jo Ann Krukar in 1981; they had three children, Sarah, Jimmy, and Julia, and later divorced. His son, Jimmy, served as a Marine rifleman in Iraq, and Webb wore his son’s old combat boots every day during the 2006 Senate campaign in tribute. In October 2005, Webb married Hong Le Webb, a Vietnamese-American lawyer born in South Vietnam; their daughter, Georgia LeAnh, was born in December 2006, and he is also stepfather to Hong Le’s daughter from a previous marriage. Webb speaks Vietnamese.