Jon Menefee

This page was current at the end of the individual's last campaign covered by Ballotpedia. Please contact us with any updates.

Jon Menefee

Republican Party

Elections and appointments

Last election

March 3, 2020

Military

Service / branch

U.S. Marine Corps

Years of service

1981 - 1984

Personal

Birthplace

Waco, Texas

Religion

Christian

Profession

IT professional

Contact

Campaign website

Campaign Facebook

Campaign Twitter

Campaign YouTube

Personal Facebook

Personal LinkedIn

Jon Menefee (Republican Party) ran for election to the U.S. House to represent Texas' 9th Congressional District. He lost in the Republican primary on March 3, 2020.

Menefee completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2019. Click here to read the survey answers.

Biography

Menefee attended Alvin Community College and the University of Houston. His professional experience includes working as an IT professional and business owner. He served in the United States Marine Corps from 1981 to 1984.

Elections

2020

See also: Texas' 9th Congressional District election, 2020

Texas' 9th Congressional District election, 2020 (March 3 Republican primary)

Texas' 9th Congressional District election, 2020 (March 3 Democratic primary)

General election

General election for U.S. House Texas District 9

Incumbent Al Green defeated Johnny Teague and Jose Sosa in the general election for U.S. House Texas District 9 on November 3, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Al Green (D)	75.5	172,938
		Johnny Teague (R)	21.6	49,575
		Jose Sosa (L)	2.9	6,594

---

	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 229,107
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

• Edward Small Jr. (Unaffiliated)

Democratic primary election

Democratic primary for U.S. House Texas District 9

Incumbent Al Green defeated Melissa M. Wilson in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Texas District 9 on March 3, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Al Green	83.6	48,387
		Melissa M. Wilson	16.4	9,511

---

	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 57,898
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Republican primary election

Republican primary for U.S. House Texas District 9

Johnny Teague defeated Jon Menefee and Julian Martinez in the Republican primary for U.S. House Texas District 9 on March 3, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Johnny Teague	58.7	6,149
		Jon Menefee	24.0	2,519
		Julian Martinez	17.3	1,809

---

	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 10,477
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

• Al Austin (R)

Libertarian convention

Libertarian convention for U.S. House Texas District 9

Jose Sosa advanced from the Libertarian convention for U.S. House Texas District 9 on March 21, 2020.

		Candidate
✔		Jose Sosa (L)

---

	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified.
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Campaign themes

2020

Video for Ballotpedia

Video submitted to Ballotpedia Released July 30, 2019

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Jon Menefee completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2019. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Menefee's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

Expand all | Collapse all

Who are you? Tell us about yourself.

I am a small business owner and a US Marine Veteran. I have lived in the 9th CD for 18 years. I am active in my community and I love where I live. The 9th district needs fresh leadership and I know I can bring it. I have practiced and lived the servant-leader role for many years and I understand what it takes to change hearts and minds. Congress is broken right now and it will take true leaders to mend the wounds and heal the scars of so many years of partisan politics.

Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about your goals for your time in office?

• New and better paying jobs for the people in the 9th district
• Criminal Justice reform
• Mental health care reform

What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

Mental health care for veterans and civilians. Instead of just throwing pills at problems and hoping that it goes away, we need to look at true long term solutions. Peer to Peer counseling is a proven strategy for tackling PTSD issues. Criminal Justice reform not just at the federal level but bring it down to the state, county and city level. Only 10% of the total prison population is under the control of the federal government. The other 90% is local. The federal government can work with local politicians to help them adopt the guidelines that the Federal government is using when prosecuting and incarcerating criminals. Right now the lawyers that are appointed to the low income population are overworked and way underpaid. When a defense attorney has over 500 cases, there is no way they can give good counsel. Minorities, accused of the same crime as others, are more likely to go to prison and be forever stigmatized.

Who do you look up to? Whose example would you like to follow, and why?

Ronald Reagan. While I am no actor, I really enjoyed how he reached out to people in a very personable way. It made you feel like you knew him personally even if you had never met

What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official?

A true servant/leader philosophy. I have never asked someone to do something for me that I am not willing to do myself. When I wanted to run for this position the first thing I did was volunteer to block walk for other candidates in 2018. I made sure that I understood what it is like to be in the heat, cold or rain. I wanted to know what it was like to walk up to a door and ask someone, that probably didn't want to talk to me, to vote for my candidate.

What qualities do you possess that you believe would make you a successful officeholder?

I know how to inspire other people and with my Marine Corp background I know how to fight for what I believe in.

What do you believe are the core responsibilities for someone elected to this office?

Understand what their district needs are and how to address them in a responsible way. If they only talk to members of their party, then they are disenfranchising the rest of the people who didn't vote for them but still need help.

What legacy would you like to leave?

Higher income for all the people in the 9th Congressional District. With higher incomes, all of the other targets that I set for my time in office can be achieved.

What is the first historical event that happened in your lifetime that you remember? How old were you at the time?

I remember the moon landing. I remember that everyone seemed excited and at the time I didn't know why, but when I think back about it, I realize that we as Americans worked together to achieve this. I was 7 years old when we landed on the moon.

What was your very first job? How long did you have it?

I was a paperboy when I turned 11. I ran two paper routes, one in the morning and one in the evening for about 1 year. I only stopped because we moved.

What qualities does the U.S. House of Representatives possess that makes it unique as an institution?

The U.S. House of Representatives have the 'power of the purse'. We have all heard that before but many do not truly understand it. Only the House of Representatives can initiate any kind of spending bill. Neither the Senate nor the President can initiate any new spending.

Do you believe that it's beneficial for representatives to have previous experience in government or politics?

I think its more beneficial that a representative have experience in the real world and know how it really is. Too many of our politicians have spent their whole lives in politics and truly have no idea what its like out here. I am not saying they all have cushy lives, they don't but they also don't seem to have a grasp of what is happening outside the beltway.

What do you perceive to be the United States’ greatest challenges as a nation over the next decade?

Our greatest challenges will not come from outside our country, but from within. We cannot be defeated when we have a common enemy but when we fight amongst ourselves, we are greatly weakened. The leaders in Washington need to either come together for the people or step down and let others who are more willing to work for the common good lead this country. We need people in leadership positions that see themselves as servants of the people first and leaders second.

If you are not a current representative, are there certain committees that you would want to be a part of?

I have an affinity for Veterans. I am a Marine Veteran and my wife is currently active duty in the Army. In Congress the Veterans affairs committee is not ranked as a high priority committee but I am not getting into politics to be on the high ranking committee. With nearly 250,000 veterans living in the Houston area veterans affairs is a top priority.

Do you believe that two years is the right term length for representatives?

I think 3 years would be a far better number of years as a representative. Right now the President and the Congress are all elected at the same time, which makes for a lot of noise that can be distracting and a distraction. The only time both Congress and the President are elected at the same time is every 4 terms for the Representatives.
Right now, the representative works for one year and spends the next year campaigning. With three years he would have the opportunity to actually get some work done before its time for hitting the campaign trail. For some representatives in Texas, they have to spend a lot of time driving.

What are your thoughts on term limits?

I believe that if the President is limited to how many times he can run for office, then all of the rest need to be limited as well. 2 terms for Senator, and 6 terms for Representatives (based on the two year terms that is now in place). We should also make many of the bureaucracy jobs term limited as well, otherwise they will be running the country and not the elected officials.

Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.

See also

2020 Elections

What's on the ballot? U.S. President U.S. Congress U.S. Congress special elections State executives State legislatures State courts Ballot measures Municipal government School boards Election analysis hub

Government

Who represents me? U.S. Congress State executives State legislators State courts Ballot measures Municipal government School boards

Newsletters

Coronavirus Weekly Updates Documenting America's Path to Recovery The Heart of the Primaries The Daily Brew The Weekly Brew The Ballot Bulletin Checks and Balances Economy and Society Hall Pass Number of the Day Robe & Gavel Union Station

External links

• Search Google News for this topic

Footnotes

[show]

Texas' current delegation to the United States Congress

Senators

John Cornyn (R)

Ted Cruz (R)

Representatives

District 1

Nathaniel Moran (R)

District 2

Daniel Crenshaw (R)

District 3

Keith Self (R)

District 4

Pat Fallon (R)

District 5

Lance Gooden (R)

District 6

Jake Ellzey (R)

District 7

Lizzie Fletcher (D)

District 8

Morgan Luttrell (R)

District 9

Al Green (D)

District 10

Michael McCaul (R)

District 11

August Pfluger (R)

District 12

Craig Goldman (R)

District 13

Ronny Jackson (R)

District 14

Randy Weber (R)

District 15

Monica De La Cruz (R)

District 16

Veronica Escobar (D)

District 17

Pete Sessions (R)

District 18

Vacant

District 19

Jodey Arrington (R)

District 20

Joaquin Castro (D)

District 21

Chip Roy (R)

District 22

Troy Nehls (R)

District 23

Tony Gonzales (R)

District 24

Beth Van Duyne (R)

District 25

Roger Williams (R)

District 26

Brandon Gill (R)

District 27

Michael Cloud (R)

District 28

Henry Cuellar (D)

District 29

Sylvia Garcia (D)

District 30

Jasmine Crockett (D)

District 31

John Carter (R)

District 32

Julie Johnson (D)

District 33

Marc Veasey (D)

District 34

Vicente Gonzalez (D)

District 35

Greg Casar (D)

District 36

Brian Babin (R)

District 37

Lloyd Doggett (D)

District 38

Wesley Hunt (R)

Republican Party (27)

Democratic Party (12)

Vacancies (1)