Senator Pat Roberts
On March 1, 2021, Senator Pat Roberts joined Riverside Strategic Solutions as the firm's Senior Consultant.
Senator Roberts was born in Topeka, Kansas and graduated from Kansas State University. He joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 1958, attaining the rank of Captain. Prior to moving to Washington in 1966 and beginning his political career, Roberts worked as a newspaper publisher and high school journalism teacher in Phoenix, AZ.
The Senator was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives by the Big 1st District of Kansas in 1980 after serving twelve years as the Administrative Assistant for his predecessor, Keith Sebelius. In the House, Roberts rose to serve as the Chairman of the Committee on Agriculture. In 1996, he was elected to the U.S. Senate where he served four consecutive terms. Until his retirement at the end of the 116th Congress in 2020, Roberts was the long-standing Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry. He is the only person in U.S. history to serve as Chair of the agriculture panels in both chambers of Congress. In those roles, Roberts played a major part in eight Farm Bills, the cornerstone laws governing American agriculture.
In addition to his chairmanship of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Roberts also served on the Committee on Finance and the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. He also served as Chairman of the Committee on Intelligence and was the first ever Chairman of the Committee on Armed Services, Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities. At the time of his retirement, Roberts was the senior member of the Congressional Marine Corps Caucus.