Andy Barr
Andy Barr has served as the U.S. Congressman for Kentucky’s Sixth Congressional District since January of 2013. Congressman Barr is a senior Member of the House Financial Services Committee and is Ranking Member of the National Security, International Development and Monetary Policy. In the 117th Congress, Congressman Barr also began serving on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and serves on the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, Central Asia and Nonproliferation.
Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Congressman Barr has fought to deliver resources to frontline healthcare heroes, small businesses, workers and families throughout Kentucky. Congressman Barr helped craft and supported five bipartisan COVID-19 relief packages. Additionally, Congressman Barr helped devise the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), delivering over $1 billion in forgivable loans to small businesses and keeping paychecks flowing to thousands of workers and their families in the Sixth District.
In the 116th Congress, Congressman Barr served on the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee (HVAC). During his time on HVAC, Congressman Barr led amendments to passage expanding access for student veterans to the Edith Nourse Rogers Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Scholarship as part of the Forever GI Bill. Congressman Barr also worked to reduce veterans’ suicide by advocating for a historic expansion of equine assisted therapy (EAT) as an innovative therapy for veterans struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or other invisible wounds of war.
Despite the challenges brought on by the pandemic in meeting with constituents face-to-face, Congressman Barr remains committed to his Accessibility Initiative. Congressman Barr created several constituent coalitions, such as the Sixth District Veterans Coalition and the Recovery Working Group focused on finding solutions that will help Kentucky’s veterans and combat the ongoing drug epidemic.
Congressman Barr is also focused on strengthening Kentucky’s signature bourbon, equine, coal, agriculture and manufacturing industries, and serves as co-chair of the bipartisan Congressional Horse and Bourbon Caucus’. In 2020, the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act, championed by Congressman Barr was signed into law by President Trump. This represented the most transformational and consequential reform of the thoroughbred horseracing industry since enactment of the Interstate Horseracing Act of 1978 and solidifies the industry for decades to come.
Congressman Barr graduated from Lexington's Henry Clay High School in 1992, earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Government and Philosophy from the University of Virginia in 1996, and received his law degree from the University of Kentucky in 2001.
Additionally, Congressman Barr is a 2007 graduate of Leadership Lexington and has served on the Board of Directors of the Friends of the Isaac Murphy Memorial Art Garden and President of Prevent Child Abuse Kentucky.
He and his late wife, Carol, have two daughters, Eleanor and Mary Clay.