Press Kit

Biography

Chief Deputy Whip Diana DeGette is serving her 10th term in Congress as Representative for the First District of Colorado. As a member of the powerful Committee on Energy and Commerce, an exclusive congressional committee with vast jurisdiction over health care, trade, business, technology, food safety, and consumer protection, she is one of the leading voices in the health care debate in this country. As lead whip, she played a vital role in the reauthorization of the Children’s Health Insurance Program, has fought for tough food safety legislation, and was a key player in crafting a comprehensive consumer product safety bill. In 2011 she was elected the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, which conducts investigations into programs within the committee’s jurisdiction.   

U.S. Rep. DeGette is also the chief architect of legislation to expand stem cell research, which has been passed twice with broad, bipartisan support in Congress. The measure was vetoed twice by President George W. Bush – including his very first presidential veto. A life-long Coloradoan, U.S. Rep. DeGette is guided by traditional Western values. She’s also the author of the landmark Colorado Wilderness Act, which would protect and preserve pristine land across Colorado for generations to come. She has fought to enhance her constituents’ access to affordable quality health care, expand mass transit, improve transportation in the Denver area, clean up environmental waste sites, and improve opportunities for small business.

Democratic Leadership

In 2005, U.S. Rep. DeGette was promoted to the House Democratic leadership as Chief Deputy Whip. As a Whip, she works to ensure passage of key pieces of legislation and orchestrate opposition to Republican legislation that is antithetical to Democratic values.  Steadily rising in the Democratic Whip organization since her first term in Congress, U.S. Rep. DeGette previously served six years as Regional Whip and two years as the Democratic Floor Whip.

Committee Membership

As Vice Chair of the powerful Committee on Energy and Commerce from 2007 to 2011, U.S. Rep. DeGette served as the Acting Chair of the committee in the Chairman’s absence, spearheaded projects, and assisted the Chairman in promoting the Committee’s legislative agenda.

A member of the Committee since her first term in Congress, she has used her position to improve health care, expand medical research, reform corporate business and accounting practices, ensure that our homeland is adequately protected, take on global climate change, and move America toward energy independence. She is as a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Health, the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, the Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection, and the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet.

In January 2011, U.S. Rep. DeGette was named the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee of Oversight and Investigations of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

Committee on Energy and Commerce Jurisdiction:

(1) National energy policy generally.

(2) Health and health facilities(except health care supported by payroll deductions).

(3) Interstate and foreign commerce generally.

(4) Consumer affairs and consumer protection.

(5) Exploration,production, storage, supply, marketing, pricing, and regulation of energy resources, including all fossil fuels, solar energy, and other unconventional or renewable energy resources.

(6) Interstate energy compacts.

(7) Conservation of energy resources.

(8) Energy information generally.

(9) The generation and marketing of power (except by federally chartered or Federal regional power marketing authorities); reliability and interstate transmission of, and rate making for, all power; and siting of generation facilities (except the installation of interconnections between Government water power projects).

(10) General management of the Department of Energy and management and all functions of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

(11) Biomedical research and development.

(12) Public health and quarantine.

(13) Regulation of the domestic nuclear energy industry, including regulation of research and development reactors and nuclear regulatory research.

(14) Regulation of interstate and foreign communications.

(15) Travel and tourism.

The committee shall have the same jurisdiction with respect to regulation of nuclear facilities and of use of nuclear energy as it has with respect to regulation of nonnuclear facilities and of use of nonnuclear energy.

Media Contact Information:

Washington, D.C. Office
Lynne Weil
Communications Director and Senior Policy Advisor
Phone: 202-225-3041
Email: lynne.weil@mail.house.gov

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