Inhofe Chief Of Staff Officially Announces Run For Senate Seat

U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe formally announced his plans to resign from the Senate, and there's already a candidate for his soon-to-be-open seat.

The candidate is Inhofe's current Chief of Staff Luke Holland. Holland officially accepted Inhofe's endorsement during a Friday afternoon news conference at the Oklahoma History Center.

Holland is a Bartlesville native who joined the Inhofe team in 2009, serving as a staff assistant, legislative correspondent, legislative assistant and legislative director. He was promoted to Chief of Staff in 2017.

Holland earned a finance degree from the University of Arkansas in 2009 before spending a year and a half with Tyson Foods, before joining Sen. Inhofe.

In a 2017 interview with 'Walton Today,' a publication from the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas, Holland told the story of how he started working for Sen. Inhofe in the mailroom.

“I said, ‘Hey, let’s give a shot and see what happens,’” Holland recalls. “Up here, you really have to start at the bottom and put in your time and be willing to do any job.”

Holland’s mailroom job included reading all of the mail that came through Inhofe’s office, much of it letters from constituents, which he assigned to different staff members. He was also Inhofe’s “body man,” political slang for personal assistant. As body man, Holland drove the senator to events and kept him on schedule.

According to his new website, LukeHolland.com, "Luke is proud to have the endorsement of Senator Inhofe, with whom he’s worked alongside for years fighting socialists in Washington, standing up for our freedoms, and working to pass the Trump agenda."

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