Jim Cooper Bio

Although Jim is best known for his long career in Congress where he served on the Banking, Budget, Energy & Commerce, Armed Services, and Intelligence committees, he has also maintained a parallel career in business. While Jim was in office, he taught for twenty years at the Owen School of Management at Vanderbilt University, and, while out-of-office, Jim was Managing Director at Equitable Securities in Nashville and co-founded Brentwood Capital Advisers. He has also been active in personal real-estate investing. Starting as the youngest congressman in America, Jim has represented millions of Tennesseans and thousands of businesses by helping them cut through government red tape. A “Blue-Dog Democrat,” Jim was known throughout his political career for his bipartisanship, his efforts to curb federal spending, and his work helping everyone thrive. Jim was a Morehead Scholar at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University in England, and received his law degree from Harvard.