Zach Wamp | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromTennessee's3rd district | |
| In office January 3, 1995 – January 3, 2011 | |
| Preceded by | Marilyn Lloyd |
| Succeeded by | Chuck Fleischmann |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Zachary Paul Wamp (1957-10-28)October 28, 1957 (age 67) Fort Benning, Georgia, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | Kimberly Wamp |
| Children | 2, includingWeston |
| Education | University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (attended) University of Tennessee, Knoxville (attended) |
Zachary Paul Wamp (born October 28, 1957) is an American politician who was theU.S. representative forTennessee's 3rd congressional district from 1995 to 2011. He is a member of theRepublican Party. The district is based inChattanooga and includes large parts ofEast Tennessee, includingOak Ridge.
Wamp was born inFort Benning, Georgia, and grew up inEast Ridge, Tennessee, a community adjacent toChattanooga, where his father worked as an architect. He attended The Lutheran School, a Lutheran elementary school. Later, with his two brothers, he attendedThe McCallie School, an all-male prep school in Chattanooga, as a day student, from the age of 11 until he graduated in 1976. He was president of the student council, active in athletics, and was the MVP of the varsity basketball team at McCallie in 1976. He was baptized, raised and confirmed in the Lutheran Church. He spent his freshman year atUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1977–78 and briefly returned in 1979–80 after his sophomore year at theUniversity of Tennessee at Knoxville between (1978–79). However, he graduated from neither and ultimately dropped out of college. He had struggled with drug and alcohol problems as a student and would eventually enter rehab.[1]
After leaving college, Wamp became a national sales supervisor forOlan Mills, a photography company based in Chattanooga that primarily produces church directories, and later became a successful commercial and industrialreal estate broker.[2] He worked in his family's architectural and development business and became vice president of Charter Real Estate Corporation in 1989. In 1992, he joined Fletcher Bright Co. in Chattanooga as a commercial and industrial real estate broker.[citation needed]
He began his career in politics as a precinct vice chairman and Youth Coordinator for the 1983 Chattanooga mayoral campaign of Gene Roberts. He became President of the Young Republicans and was later elected chairman of theHamilton County,Tennessee Republican Party, then regional director for the Tennessee GOP.[citation needed]
Wamp ran for theHouse of Representatives as a Republican in 1992 against nine-termDemocratMarilyn Lloyd. He nearly scored a major upset, only losing by 1.3 points—only 2,900 votes out of 210,000 total votes cast.
When Lloyd did not run for re-election in 1994, Wamp ran again. Battling through a hotly contested primary, he easily defeated his childhood friend and sitting State RepresentativeKenneth J. Meyer by nearly two to one. During the race, Wamp signed theContract with America. He also personally committed to serve no more than six terms and further committed to not accept special interest PAC money. He proposed a plan to pay congressmen the same asLieutenant Colonels and linked his Democratic opponent, Randy Button, toBill Clinton. Wamp won the general election with 52% of the vote, during theRepublican Revolution. He likely got coattails from Bill Frist's and Fred Thompson's strong 1994 statewide elections, and was helped by Lloyd crossing party lines to endorse him. He was re-elected with slightly less difficulty in 1996. After his first two elections, he never faced another close contest; from 1998 onward, he won by 64 percent or more of the vote. Wamp explored seeking a seat in theUnited States Senate to succeedBill Frist, who had promised to serve no more than two terms. He decided against running for that seat in October 2004.
When he was elected to the House in 1994, Wamp pledged to serve just twelve years (six terms) in the House. However, shortly after winning reelection to a sixth term in 2004, Wamp announced he would run again in 2006 after all, citing his status as Tennessee's only member of the powerful Appropriations Committee. The pledge was "a mistake," he told the Associated Press in 2004.[3]
Wamp faced Brent Benedict, a computer programmer and consultant. During the campaign, Benedict made an issue of Wamp breaking his term limit pledge, saying that he would hold himself to six terms if elected.[4] Despite this, Wamp was easily reelected.
Following the GOP losing the U.S. House and U.S. Senate in the 2006 midterm elections, Wamp reflected on the defeat saying, "For the first six years of the 12 years, we were focused on policy and principles, and politics was secondary. The second six years, politics became primary: raising money, going negative, consolidating power."[5]
He won re-election with 69% of the vote, his best election performance.
Wamp was a member of the powerfulHouse Appropriations Committee, a post he has used to champion what he called his highest legislative priority—funding for his district's decaying lock at theChickamauga Dam.[6][7] In 2006, the eight-year, $349 million project was approved, but Wamp has had to continually work to protect the project from budget cuts and shortfalls.[8] Indeed, he cited his status as the only Tennessean on that committee as a reason for dropping his original term-limit pledge. He also secured in the 2006 budget a $4 million appropriation for amethamphetamine task force[citation needed], which was started in 1999 and has since expanded to all regions of Tennessee. Wamp has vigorously supported theTennessee Valley Authority, one of the largest government-owned firms in the United States.
Wamp supported legislation to allow the posting of theTen Commandments in public buildings. He changed his vote from "nay" to "yea" on the bill of theWall Street bailout,[9] but later has said he regrets that vote.[10] In 2003, he was one of two congressmen to have received a 100 percent rating from theAmerican Conservative Union.[11]
In the wake ofTom DeLay's indictment in September 2005, Wamp campaigned among his fellow Republican House members to become the majority whip, the number three position in the Republican House leadership.[12] RepresentativesRay LaHood andGil Gutknecht agreed to co-chair his campaign for the position. However, the incumbent,Roy Blunt, remained the majority whip because Blunt lost his race for Majority Leader (the position was won byJohn Boehner in February 2006).
Wamp served on theLiberty Caucus (sometimes called the Liberty Committee), a Republican group that focuses on reducing the size of the US Government. CongressmanRon Paul hosts a luncheon for the Liberty Caucus every Thursday.
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On January 5, 2009, Wamp announced that he would run forGovernor of Tennessee in the Republican primaries.[13] In the primary, he placed second with 29% of the vote.
On July 23, 2010,Hotline OnCall published statements made by Wamp in an interview, in which he said that thehealth care reforms proposed during the Obama administration had placed state governments in"an untenable position". Wamp also suggested the possibility ofsecession arising from opposition to the federal government, stating"I hope that the American people will go to the ballot box in 2010 and 2012 so that states are not forced to consider separation from this government", as well as expressing support for Texas GovernorRick Perry's similar statements regarding secession.[14] Wamp's statements drew national attention, prompting Wamp to state that his remarks were misinterpreted, and that he did not support secession.[15] OpponentRon Ramsey labeled the remarks Wamp's"over-the-top temperament and overheated, sometimes crazy rhetoric".[16]
Wamp was unsuccessful in his bid to be the Republican candidate for Tennessee's Governor, losing toBill Haslam in the August 5, 2010 open primary.[17]
After leaving office, he launched a consulting firm Zach Wamp Consulting/Business Development representing mostly energy and security related firms. He also joined with two others to start a STEM awareness, Computer Science and Coding platform called Learning Blade which went national and sold to E-Dynamic Learning and ultimately to Pearson. He also became involved in political reform efforts, including joining nine other former members of Congress to co-author a 2021 opinion editorial advocating reforms of Congress.[18]As a volunteer, he chaired the planning team for the National Prayer Breakfast from 2016-2023 and as Chairman of the Gospel Music Foundation he led the Capital raise and development of the Museum of Christian & Gospel Music in downtown Nashville which opened on October 3, 2025.
| Year | Republican | Votes | Pct | Democratic | Votes | Pct | 3rd Party | Party | Votes | Pct | 3rd Party | Party | Votes | Pct | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1992 | Zach Wamp | 102,763 | 47% | Marilyn Lloyd | 105,693 | 49% | Carol Hagan | Independent | 4,433 | 2% | Pete Melcher | Independent | 2,048 | 1% | * |
| 1994 | Zach Wamp | 84,583 | 52% | Randy Button | 73,839 | 46% | Thomas Morrell | Independent | 1,929 | 1% | Richard M. Sims | Independent | 1,498 | 1% | * |
| 1996 | Zach Wamp | 113,408 | 56% | Charles N. Jolly | 85,714 | 43% | William A. Cole | Independent | 1,002 | <1% | Walt Ward | Independent | 718 | <1% | * |
| 1998 | Zach Wamp | 75,100 | 66% | James M. Lewis | 37,144 | 33% | Richard M. Sims | Independent | 1,468 | 1% | * | ||||
| 2000 | Zach Wamp | 139,840 | 64% | William Callaway | 75,785 | 35% | Trudy Austin | Libertarian | 3,235 | 1% | * | ||||
| 2002 | Zach Wamp | 112,254 | 65% | John Wolfe | 58,824 | 34% | William Bolen | Independent | 1,743 | 1% | Timothy A. Sevier | Independent | 947 | 1% | * |
| 2004 | Zach Wamp | 166,154 | 65% | John Wolfe | 84,295 | 33% | June Griffin | Independent | 3,018 | 1% | Doug Vandagriff | Independent | 1,696 | 1% | * |
| 2006 | Zach Wamp | 130,791 | 66% | Brent Benedict | 68,324 | 34% | * | ||||||||
| 2008 | Zach Wamp | 184,787 | 69% | Doug Vandagriff | 73,030 | 27% | Jean Howard-Hill | Independent | 4,846 | 2% | Ed Choate | Independent | 3,749 | 1% | * |
Zach and his wife, Kim, have two children and five grandchildren. His sonWeston currently serves as the mayor ofHamilton County, Tennessee. His daughter Coty Wamp currently serves as the District Attorney General.[20]
| U.S. House of Representatives | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromTennessee's 3rd congressional district 1995–2011 | Succeeded by |
| U.S. order of precedence (ceremonial) | ||
| Preceded byas Former U.S. Representative | Order of precedence of the United States as Former U.S. Representative | Succeeded byas Former U.S. Representative |
