Amy Jean Klobuchar (/ˈkloʊbəʃɑːr/ KLOH-bə-shar; born May 25, 1960) is an American politician and lawyer serving as the senior United States senator from Minnesota, a seat she has held since 2007.

[2][3][4] On February 10, 2019, Klobuchar announced her candidacy for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States in the 2020 election; on March 2, 2020, she suspended her campaign and endorsed Joe Biden.

[16] Her senior thesis, Uncovering the Dome,[17] a 250-page history of the ten years of politics surrounding the building of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis, was published by Waveland Press in 1986.

[19][20][21] Her first foray into politics came after she gave birth and was forced to leave the hospital 24 hours later, a situation exacerbated by the fact that Klobuchar's daughter, Abigail,[16] was born with a disorder that prevented her from swallowing.

The experience led Klobuchar to appear before the Minnesota State Legislature, advocating for a bill that would guarantee new mothers a 48-hour hospital stay.

But she had pledged to drop out if the incumbent, Michael Freeman, got back in the race after failing to win the endorsement of the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor (DFL) Party for governor.

[27] In 2002, Klobuchar spearheaded an effort that resulted in state laws being altered to allow felony charges to be brought against repeat drunk driving offenders.

In 2003, Klobuchar dealt with one of her highest-profile cases when the Hennepin County Attorney's Office brought several charges against former professional baseball player Kirby Puckett related to an alleged sex crime.

For property crime offenders who had already received five convictions, Klobuchar's office similarly pursued longer sentences than had been recommended.

[28] During Klobuchar's tenure, the preexisting disparity of African Americans imprisoned at a greater rate than white people decreased in severity.

[34] As was common practice at the time, especially in Minnesota, to determine whether to bring charges in such instances, Klobuchar relied on grand jury recommendations.

[36] Critics of her use of grand juries alleged that it lacked transparency and was perhaps a tactic for Klobuchar to distance herself from responsibility for the decisions made.

[28][36] After the 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis Police custody, renewed attention was brought to Klobuchar's tenure as Hennepin County Attorney.

Attention was also brought to the fact that during Klobuchar's tenure an officer-involved killing had occurred that involved Officer Derek Chauvin, who later murdered Floyd.

The killing occurred in October 2006, several months before Klobuchar left office, and a grand jury was empaneled by her successor (Freeman, who returned for a second stint as county attorney).

[37] This renewed scrutiny arose several months after Klobuchar concluded her presidential campaign, and while reporting had named her as a potential running mate of presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

)[40] Klobuchar won a second term in the U.S. Senate, defeating Republican state representative Kurt Bills by a margin of 35 percentage points (65.23% to 30.53%), carrying all but two counties.

[49] In February 2017 she called for an independent, bipartisan commission to investigate ties between Russia and President Donald Trump and his administration.

[50][51] Klobuchar had already signaled her interest in U.S.–Russia relations in December 2016 when she joined Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham on a trip to the Baltic states and Ukraine.

[56] According to the Center for Effective Lawmaking, Klobuchar scored "above expectations" with respect to how successful she was at moving significant legislation in the 115th Congress (2017–18).

[59][60] In February 2019, BuzzFeed News reported that interviews with former staffers and reviews of emails indicated that Klobuchar frequently abused and humiliated her employees, requiring significant staff time to manage her ire.

[63] In response to the negative reports, 61 former staffers wrote an open letter praising Klobuchar, stating that she was a caring "mentor and friend" to them.

Later that day, Klobuchar said she supported the invocation of the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution to remove Trump from office "because you cannot have a president basically leading an insurrection against our own country's government.

[74][75] On March 30, 2008, Klobuchar announced her endorsement of Senator Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primary, promising her superdelegate vote to him.

[122] On May 21, 2020, it was reported that Biden asked several women, including Klobuchar, to undergo formal vetting for consideration as his vice-presidential running mate.

[128] In 1993, Klobuchar married John Bessler, a private practice attorney and a professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law.

[131][132] In September 2021, Klobuchar revealed that she had been diagnosed with Stage 1A breast cancer in February 2021, that she had undergone a successful lumpectomy, and that in May she had completed a course of radiation treatment.

[137] She was one of the recipients of the Agricultural Retailers Association's 2012 Legislator of the Year Award, alongside Republican representative John Mica.

[138] In 2013, Klobuchar received an award for her leadership in the fight to prevent sexual assault in the military at a national summit hosted by the Service Women's Action Network (SWAN).

[141] She received the American Bar Association's Congressional Justice Award in 2015 for her efforts to protect vulnerable populations from violence, exploitation, and assault and to eliminate discrimination in the workplace.