Brian Mendoza/Thresher
In 2010, Annise Parker ’78 stood in front of a crowd at the George R. Brown Convention Center. She had just been elected mayor of Houston.
Parker was the first openly gay woman to vote for City Council, and her election was greeted with both celebration and trepidation. That night, she stood to the crowd at the convention center in her first speech as mayor.
“I’m very proud to be elected as the first…” Parker paused, “…to graduate from Rice University and become the mayor of Houston.”
In an interview with the Thresher, Parker said he used Rice’s fame and unifying power to gain common ground with Houstonians. Although it is not a powerhouse producing politics at the university level like Harvard or Georgetown, several graduates have entered the political world over the years.
That small group of owls includes Josh Earnest ’97, former White House press secretary for Barack Obama and current university trustee, and Ben Rhodes ’00, former vice presidential national security adviser.
Glenn Allen Youngkin ’90, an American businessman and politician, has been serving as Governor of Virginia since 2022. Andy Coplin ’88, former president of Baker University, served as deputy mayor of New Orleans from 2010 to 2016.
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Additionally, Rice University produces internationally successful graduates. George Chan ’66 (also known as Zhang Tsang-hung) is a Taiwanese politician and independence activist who served as mayor of Tainan City from 1997 to 2001.
George Prescott Bush ’98 is an American politician and lawyer who served as the head of the Texas General Land Office from 2015 to 2023. Despite his family’s accomplished political career, after graduating from Rice University, Bush’s main interest was not in running for president, but in education and civil service.
Prior to attending law school, I taught social studies at a public high school in Florida for several years. He said his time in the military was the most fulfilling role he had ever had.
“When I was at Rice, I never thought about that,” Bush said in an interview with Thresher. “Looking back, I wish I had spent more time in the military. I served 10 years in the Reserves and spent some time overseas, but on paper the pinnacle of my career was at State. I think my overall role is to serve as a land commissioner, and I think I’m the only Rice Owl to fulfill that role.”
President Bush said he felt that the values and expectations of political candidates had deteriorated.
“It used to be that the desire to serve was so important, the amount of skill and wisdom you offered to other leaders and to your constituents,” Bush said. “I feel like it’s not that much, but it’s true.
“From now on, it will be about how bombastic and how extreme you can be in politics that will lead to greater success, especially when it comes to redistricting, the influence of money, and political primaries in politics that reward extremism.” Yes, in the process.”
Ed Emmett ’71 has served as a county judge and is currently a Baker Institute Fellow in Energy and Transportation, returning to transportation issues, a field he specialized in since his time in the Texas House of Representatives.
“Ironically, so many people here know me as a county judge, but I didn’t have much to do with transportation,” Emmett told Thresher. “So being able to come back to Rice and be able to re-establish myself and get back to what has really been my life’s work, except for a brief period of 12 years as a county judge, It was a godsend.”
Like many Rice University students interested in a career in politics, his first step toward that path was to run for university president.
“I am the oldest living president of Lovett College,” Emmett said. “I was a freshman who ran for treasurer. I won because I was on the tennis team and all the jocks voted for me. Block voting — I mean, what? Can you say that?”
This success, he said, further fueled his aspirations. In fact, it goes beyond the unspoken rules of university government.
“I ran for president (next year), and I was the first young person to run for president of a university,” Emmett said. “They said, ‘Wait, we can’t do that.’ They said, ‘You have to be a senior,’ so I said, ‘No, it’s not written anywhere,’ and I told my juniors, ‘No, it’s not written anywhere.’ I was selected.”
After graduation, he spent a year as a tennis coach at a country club, then pursued his interest in politics by pursuing a master’s degree in public relations from the University of Texas at Austin, although he initially planned to attend law school. obtained.
As Emmett experienced, over the course of a career, the needs of the public prompt officials to learn about specific issues, regardless of their formal role.
“When I first ran for state representative, I knocked on 19,404 doors,” Emmett said. “One of the big issues in the Kingwood area where I lived was that we needed an overpass, so I said, “Okay, vote for me, let’s get an overpass. ” he said. Then I won. I had no idea how to get to the overpass. ”
“We lived in a time when, regardless of political party, if you were a well-known expert in an area like public education, transportation, or redistricting, other legislators would listen to you. I don’t think that happens very often.”
He shares this willingness to work together across party lines with another owl no stranger to the city of Houston.
Parker served as the 61st mayor of Houston from 2010 to 2016. But for Mr. Parker, politics was not an end in itself, but the result of an unrelated job.
“When I got a job, I went to work for an oil company because in 1978, when I graduated, oil companies accounted for 80 percent of the Houston economy,” Parker said. “I worked to support a volunteer habit, so for the first 10 years after graduation I spent most of my volunteer time working with LGBT organizations, and for the next 10 years I spent most of my volunteer time working with Civic Associations and Housing. I spent it volunteering for United Way. That kind of thing.”
Parker said she has the same advice for owls aspiring to follow in her footsteps and those passionate about completely different careers.
“The least you can do to participate in a democracy is to vote,” Parker said. “But I also think that for Rice students, the bare minimum is never enough…pick a campaign, pick a candidate, pick an issue and get involved. It’s easier to elect people who agree with you on an issue than to get them to change their minds about something. So get out there.”
