What Is Rick Perry's Net Worth?
Rick Perry is an American politician who has a net worth of $3 million. Rick Perry is probably most notable for being the former Governor of Texas, the United States Secretary of Energy, and a Republican Presidential primary candidate. Rick has accumulated his net worth largely through his family's fortune, his published books, and his successful career in politics. The latter began at a very early age for Perry, when at 11 years old his father (also a politician) took him to the funeral of U.S. Representative Sam Rayburn. After graduating from college, Perry joined the U.S. Air Force, where he eventually ascended to the rank of captain. After leaving the Air Force, he returned to his home in Texas to work as a cotton farmer with his father.
From there, Rick began taking the idea of working in politics seriously; eventually winning the 2002 gubernatorial election in Texas after having taken the office in 2000 after then-Governor George W. Bush was elected President. Since holding the office, Perry has earned his share of supporters and enemies. One of his most infamous actions was the stonewalling of the investigation into the innocence of death row inmate Cameron Todd Willingham, who is believed by many to be completely innocent of the crime he was convicted of and executed for. After much positive attention in the media and among voters, Perry joined the Republican primary for President in 2012 and 2016 but ended up suspending his campaigns. He served as the Governor of Texas until January 2015, then he was the United States Secretary of Energy from March 2017 to January 2019. Rick has published the books "On My Honor: Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts are Worth Fighting For" (2008) and "Fed Up! Our Fight to Save America from Washington" (2010).
Early Life
Rick Perry was born James Richard Perry on March 4, 1950, in Haskell, Texas. He is a fifth-generation Texan, and he grew up in Paint Creek. He is the son of Amelia and Joseph Perry, who were both dryland cotton farmers, and he has an older sister. Rick has English ancestry. His father was a Democrat who was the Haskell County commissioner and a member of the school board. Perry became interested in politics when his father took him to the 1961 funeral of Sam Rayburn, a U.S. Representative from Texas who served as the 43rd Speaker of the United States House of Representatives.
During his youth, Rick joined the Boy Scouts of America, earning the rank of Eagle Scout. The organization honored him with its Distinguished Eagle Scout Award. Perry graduated from Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Science degree in animal science in 1972. There, he was a member of the Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity and the Corps of Cadets, and he was the senior class social secretary. In the early 1970s, he interned as a door-to-door book salesman for Southwestern Advantage, which he has described as "one of the most important formative experiences of [his] life." After college, he joined the U.S. Air Force, and in early 1974, he completed pilot training. He was subsequently assigned to the 772nd Tactical Airlift Squadron at Texas' Dyess Air Force Base as a Lockheed C-130 Hercules pilot. Rick also spent some time at RAF Mildenhall in England and Rhein-Main Air Base in Germany. When he left the military in 1977, he had attained the rank of captain.
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Career
In 1984, Perry, a Democrat from District 64, was elected to the Texas House of Representatives. During his three terms in office, he served on the House Calendars Committee and the House Appropriations Committee. He was named one of the legislature's ten most effective members by The Dallas Morning News.
In 1989, Rick switched parties and became a Republican. In 1990, he ran for the office of Agriculture Commissioner and narrowly defeated incumbent Democrat Jim Hightower. Perry was reelected in 1994 with 62% of the vote. He ran for lieutenant governor in 1998 and defeated Democrat John Sharp with 50.04% of the vote. Rick was the first Republican lieutenant governor of Texas since Reconstruction, which ended in 1877.
On December 21, 2000, Perry began serving as the state's governor after then-Governor George W. Bush won the presidential election. Rick set a record for vetoing 82 acts during the 2001 legislative session, and he won the 2002 election with 58% of the vote. He became one of just five Texas governors to serve three terms, and as of this writing, he is the state's longest-serving governor (14 years). In July 2013, he announced that he would not seek a fourth term.
In late 2016, President-elect Trump nominated Perry for the position of Secretary of Energy despite the fact that Rick had previously said that the Department of Energy should be abolished. He was confirmed by the Senate on March 2, 2017. Perry served as Secretary of Energy until December 2019, and his resignation was reportedly related to his involvement in the scandal that arose after Trump called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and asked him to investigate Joe Biden. Trump claimed that he only called Zelenskyy because Perry asked him to speak to Volodymyr about a liquefied natural gas plant. However, there was no mention of the subject in the summary of the conversation that was publicly released.
Personal Life
Rick married his childhood sweetheart, Mary Anita Thigpen, on November 6, 1982. They have known each other since elementary school, and they have welcomed daughter Sydney and son Griffin together. Thigpen has a nursing degree, and she has spearheaded several health-related initiatives, including the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio's Anita Thigpen Perry Endowment, which focuses on health education, cardiovascular disease, and early childhood development. The Perry family attended Austin's Tarrytown United Methodist Church until 2010, then they switched to an evangelical Christian megachurch called Lake Hills Church because it was near the rental house Rick and Anita lived in when the governor's mansion was being renovated. In 2010, the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution honored Perry with its Gold Good Citizenship Medal "in recognition of his outstanding achievements of National importance by improving the quality of life for all Americans along the U.S.-Mexican border."
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