Background and career
Joshua David Hawley (born December 31, 1979) is an American politician and attorney serving as the senior United States senator from Missouri, a seat he has held since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, Hawley served as the 42nd attorney general of Missouri from 2017 to 2019, before defeating two-term incumbent Democratic senator Claire McCaskill in the 2018 election. He was reelected in 2024. Born in Springdale, Arkansas, to a banker and a teacher, Hawley graduated from Stanford University in 2002 and Yale Law School in 2006. After being a law clerk to Judge Michael W. McConnell and Chief Justice John Roberts, he worked as a lawyer, first in private practice from 2008 to 2011 and then for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty from 2011 to 2015. Before being elected Missouri attorney general, he was also an associate professor at the University of Missouri School of Law, and a faculty member of the conservative Blackstone Legal Fellowship. As Missouri attorney general, Hawley initiated several high-profile lawsuits and investigations, including a lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act, an investigation into Missouri governor Eric Greitens, and a lawsuit and investigation into companies associated with the opioid epidemic. His political beliefs have been described as populist and socially conservative.
In December 2020, Hawley became the first senator to announce plans to object to the certification of Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 United States presidential election. He led efforts in the Senate to do so.
Joshua David Hawley was born on December 31, 1979, in Springdale, Arkansas, to banker Ronald Hawley and teacher Virginia Hawley. In 1981, the Hawleys moved to Lexington, Missouri, after Ronald joined a division of Boatmen's Bancshares there. Hawley attended Lexington Middle School and Rockhurst High School, a private Jesuit boys' prep school in Kansas City, Missouri. He graduated in 1998 as a valedictorian. According to his middle school principal, Barbara Weibling, several of Hawley's teachers thought "he was probably going to be president one day." While in high school, Hawley regularly wrote columns for his hometown newspaper, The Lexington News, about such topics as the American militia movement following the Oklahoma City bombing, media coverage of Los Angeles Police Department detective Mark Fuhrman, and affirmative action, which he opposed. Hawley studied history at Stanford University, where his mother was an alumna. He graduated in 2002 with a Bachelor of Arts degree with highest honors and Phi Beta Kappa membership. He studied under professor David M. Kennedy, who later contributed the foreword to Hawley's book Theodore Roosevelt: Preacher of Righteousness. Kennedy said Hawley stood out in a school "which is overstuffed with overachieving and very talented young people" and called him "arguably the most gifted student I taught in 50 years". In the summer of 2000, Hawley was an intern at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. After spending ten months in London teaching at St Paul's School from 2002 to 2003, Hawley returned to the U.S. to attend Yale Law School, graduating in 2006 with a Juris Doctor degree. The Kansas City Star reported that Hawley's classmates regarded him as "politically ambitious and a deeply religious conservative". At Yale, Hawley was articles editor of the Yale Law Journal, editor of the Yale Law & Policy Review, and president of the school's Federalist Society chapter.
Hawley spent two years as a law clerk after law school, clerking first for Judge Michael W. McConnell of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit from 2006 to 2007, then for Chief Justice John Roberts of the U.S. Supreme Court from 2007 to 2008. While at the Supreme Court, Hawley met his future wife, Erin Morrow, now known as Erin Hawley, a fellow Yale Law graduate who was also clerking for Roberts. After his clerkships, Hawley worked in private practice as an appellate litigator at the law firm Hogan & Hartson (now Hogan Lovells) from 2008 to 2011. In 2011, Hawley returned to Missouri and became an associate professor at the University of Missouri Law School, where he taught constitutional law, constitutional theory, legislation, and torts. From 2011 to 2015 Hawley was with Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. At Becket, he wrote briefs and gave legal advice in the Supreme Court cases Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church & School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, decided in 2012, and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, decided in 2014.
Hawley launched his campaign for attorney general of Missouri on July 23, 2015. Of the $9.2 million raised for the campaign, $4.4 million was provided by David Humphreys, CEO of Joplin-based Tamko Building Products. On August 2, 2016, Hawley defeated Kurt Schaefer in the Republican primary with 64% of the vote. He defeated Democrat Teresa Hensley in the general election with 58.5% of the vote. During the campaign, Hawley criticized "career politicians" who were "climbing the ladder" from one position to another. This was later a focus of bipartisan criticism of him because he ran for the U.S. Senate only two years later. When elected, Hawley became the state's first Republican attorney general since 1988.
Hawley was sworn in as attorney general on January 9, 2017, by Missouri Supreme Court chief justice Patricia Breckenridge.
Sources
Net-worth figure: Celebrity Net Worth (October 2026), in USD. Biography and career facts: the person's Wikipedia article and linked reporting. Snapshot date for all StarWorth figures: 28 October 2026.
