Gilmore, Jim (1949-…) is an American politician. A member of the Republican Party , Gilmore served as governor of Virginia , a Southern State of the United States , from 1998 to 2002.
James Stuart Gilmore III was born in Richmond, Virginia, on Oct. 6, 1949. In 1971, he earned an undergraduate degree in foreign policy from the University of Virginia . After graduation, Gilmore joined the United States Army as an intelligence officer. He was stationed in what was then West Germany and learned to speak fluent German. In 1974, he retired from active duty in the Army and enrolled in law school. He received a degree from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1977. He then worked as an attorney in private practice.
In 1987, Gilmore won election as the commonwealth’s attorney (local prosecutor) for Henrico County, Virginia. In 1993, he was elected Virginia’s attorney general , the state’s chief law officer. He won election as governor in 1997 and served in the position from 1998 to 2002. In 2001, he served as chairman of the Republican National Committee. In late 2006, Gilmore began a campaign for the Republican Party’s nomination for president of the United States . He dropped out of the race, however, in July 2007. In 2008, Gilmore lost a race for a U.S. Senate seat to Democrat Mark Warner , a fellow former Virginia governor.
Following his term as governor, Gilmore worked as an attorney and served on the boards of a number of corporations. In 2009, he became president and chief executive officer of the Free Congress Foundation, a conservative public-policy research organization. In 2015, Gilmore began a campaign for his party’s 2016 nomination for president. His candidacy, however, failed to attract many supporters.
