Patrick J. Toomey (born November 17, 1961 in Providence, Rhode Island) is a United States politician. He was a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania. He represented Pennsylvania's 15th Congressional district from 1999 to January 2005, but retired at the end of his last Congressional term to fulfill his self-imposed term limits. Toomey was raised by working-class parents. Through scholarships, he was able to attend LaSalle Academy and Harvard University. After graduating, he worked for several investment firms, living mostly in New York City and, for a time, in Hong Kong.
In the early 1990s, Toomey moved to the Lehigh Valley with his brothers to open a series of bars and restaurants in the area. He often cites his experience as a small-business owner to criticize what he refers to as excessive government regulation and taxes.
In November 1997, Toomey married his wife Kris. They have two children, Bridget and Patrick.
In 2004, he challenged incumbent Senator Arlen Specter in the Republican primary election. Aided by $2 million of advertising from the Club for Growth (a conservative political action committee that focuses on fiscal issues and targets moderate Republican incumbents), Toomey criticized Specter as a liberal spendthrift and lost by a 1.7 percent margin. Toomey's campaign theme was that Specter, a moderate, was not conservative enough to be the Republican nominee from Pennsylvania.
In January 2005, Toomey assumed the presidency of the Club for Growth.
