A member of the Republican Party, he served as Speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, and the superintendent of Eastern Carver County School District 112, based in Chaska.

[1][2] Jennings served in the United States Marine Corps for five years and was honorably discharged with the rank of staff-sergeant in December 1972.

degree in political science, magna cum laude, from Minnesota State University, Mankato in 1976.

He worked in small construction and as a Congressional staff aide until he was first elected to the Minnesota House of Representatives in 1978.

[1] Beginning in 1990, Jennings was employed as a corporate executive for Schwan's Food Co., based in Marshall, Minnesota, leaving there in December 1998.