Former members of Congress take their experience to county government

Key Takeaways

After more than four decades of combined service in Congress, five former federal lawmakers are now putting their experience to work closer to home — as county officials. For them, leaving Washington has meant gaining a more direct role in addressing the needs of their communities, where they can see the impact of their work more quickly and tangibly.

After serving four terms in Congress, San Bernardino County, Calif. Supervisor Paul Cook chose not to run for re-election, so that he could pursue a seat on the county’s Board of Supervisors, feeling that he could make more impact at the local level. He once served as Yucca Valley’s mayor and on the town council. 

“In Washington, you spend more time fighting than solving problems,” Cook wrote in a statement to County News. “You’re part of a body of 435 members that begins every debate with everyone’s mind already made up. 

“County government is five people in a room who have to deliver sheriff’s coverage, roads, fire protection, senior housing. I wanted to be closer to the people who live with those decisions. I want to see people actually helped by the decisions my colleagues and I make.”

Cook was elected to the role of county supervisor in 2020 and said he’s found the on-the-ground nature of local government to be more rewarding than work at the federal level “because you can point to a station, a senior complex or a winter rescue vehicle and know how it helped someone’s life.”

There’s more compromise at the local level, Cook noted. 

County officials “still argue, but you can’t hide behind a caucus or a tweet,” Cook wrote. “Neighbors, cities and unincorporated communities need the same things: public safety, water, jobs. Everyone is trying to achieve the same things, so it’s more about how to get there than who gets credit. 

“The United States was built on compromise; local government still has to practice it.”

The structure of county government also allows for more to get done in a quicker time frame, noted San Mateo County, Calif. Supervisor Jackie Speier, who served nearly 15 years in Congress. 

“On the local level, you can just move much more swiftly,” Speier said. “You’re dealing with the same constituents, and you can provide immediate relief … It takes forever to get something passed in Congress, but on the other hand, you have a huge megaphone.”

Speier was a county commissioner in the 1980s and returned to the role in 2025. The scope of the job has changed significantly in that time, she noted. 

“It’s much more complex, the services that are provided are much more elaborate,” Speier said. “We didn’t talk about homeless people when I was on the Board of Supervisors in the ‘80s and [now] we have offices dedicated to that function and we spend a lot of time trying to keep people in their homes so that they don’t become homeless.

“We’re the richest county in California and the fourth richest in the country, and we’ve got 27,000 kids living in poverty, so a lot of my energy is focused on trying to lift people out of poverty and not hollowing out the middle class at the same time.”

Speier fell into politics as a teenager. She responded to campaign mail sent out by California State Assembly Member Leo Ryan, saying that she didn’t have any money to contribute, but was a high school student interested in working on a campaign. Speier ended up canvassing for Ryan, and later went on to serve as his staffer when he was elected to Congress. 

In 1978, she traveled with Rep. Ryan to Guyana to investigate human rights violations and cult conditions at the Jonestown agricultural commune. When Ryan and his delegation attempted to leave with defectors of the Peoples Temple cult, he was shot and killed and Speier was shot five times. She was rescued and airlifted after spending 22 hours on the tarmac without medical care. The experience shaped her perspective as a public servant. 

During her time in the state legislature, Speier had a record 300 bills become law, and in Congress, she led historic reforms against sexual assault and harassment in the military and on Capitol Hill. 

“Once you look death in the eye, you’re not afraid anymore,” Speier said. “And it made me somewhat fearless in terms of taking on issues. In the state legislature, I took on the banks and the insurance companies, I took on the correctional guards union. In Congress, I took on the military, I took on the ME TOO (Member and Employee Training and Oversight) Congress Act. You’re able to do things that I think, under other circumstances, you may have been a little timid [about].”

For Maricopa County, Ariz. Supervisor Debbie Lesko, having connections at the state and federal level from her nine years in the Arizona State Legislature and nearly seven years in Congress has helped her tell the county story. 

“Now that I’m a county supervisor, I honestly admit that I didn’t really know the negative impacts that happened to the county when we made bad decisions at the state level,” Lesko said. “So, I try to tell that to my state legislators now, and also my federal congressmen.

“It’s been very helpful to me and to the county that I have contacts at the federal level. Let’s say there’s an [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] issue in Maricopa County. Well, I happen to know the EPA administrator, Lee Zeldin. We were on a team together in the Judiciary Committee in Congress, and so I can call him.” 

Before stepping into the role of county supervisor, Lesko hadn’t served in any capacity at the local level, but she said it felt like a logical next step after leaving Congress. 

“I really like helping people,” Lesko said. “It’s very satisfying … It’s unbelievable how much the county does. 

“One of the things that’s really satisfying is helping my constituents with day-to-day problems that they have and also being involved in elections and making sure that our elections in Maricopa County are being done smoothly and fairly.”

After more than five years in Congress, Janice Hahn resigned to run for a seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. During her campaign, she told the nonprofit newsroom LAist that she could do “so much more” for her constituents as a county supervisor than in Congress. 

“It’s much more collegial,” she said. There’s “much more opportunity to work together and get things done for the people of Los Angeles County.” 

Her father, Kenneth Hahn, served on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors for 40 years. 

“I literally was born into county government,” Hahn told LAist. “I think for me, once I believed I was going to be in public service myself, I think this was a job I had always had my eyes on.”

Another congresswoman-turned-Los Angeles County Supervisor, Hilda Solis, is now eying a return to Washington. She served eight years in Congress in the aughts, and is now running again to represent California’s 38th Congressional District. 

“After a decade at the county, I have seen firsthand where federal policy is falling short and what happens when local communities are left to deal with the consequences,” Solis wrote in a statement to County News. “I want to take that experience back to Congress and work to change the policies that are hurting working families.” 

Solis, the daughter of Mexican and Nicaraguan immigrants, was the first Latina elected to the California State Senate and the first to serve in a U.S. presidential cabinet, as Secretary of Labor under President Barack Obama. 

“My parents worked hard to build a better life for our family, and growing up in the San Gabriel Valley, I saw communities that were too often overlooked and left out of important decisions,” she wrote. “Those experiences shaped my belief that government can be a force for opportunity when it listens to and invests in the people it serves.”

Solis initially left Congress to make her mark closer to home, where government has a more direct role in people’s day-to-day lives, she said. 

“I have been able to bring the experience I gained at the federal level to issues people are dealing with every day,” Solis wrote. 

“Whether it is helping a family access health care, supporting a small business or bringing new investment to a community facing a housing crisis, the work is immediate and tangible. That is what has made serving at the county level one of the most meaningful chapters of my career.”

While Solis is eager to take on federal policy again, she’ll miss witnessing the impact county government makes on-the-ground. 

“I will miss the ability to work on an issue and see the results firsthand,” Solis wrote. “At the county level, you are close to the work. You can identify a problem, bring the right people to the table, find the resources and see a project through.”