Governor (United States)

Governors carry out their management and leadership responsibilities and objectives with the support and assistance of department and agency heads, many of whom they are empowered to appoint.

A majority of governors have the authority to appoint state court judges as well, in most cases from a list of names submitted by a nominations committee.

[2] All with the exception of five states and one territory (Arizona, Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon, Puerto Rico, and Wyoming) have a lieutenant governor.

Each state has its own constitution, grounded in republican principles, and government, consisting of three branches: executive, legislative, and judicial.

Examples of measurable personal factors are how large a governor's margin of victory was on election day, and standing in public opinion polls.

In the early years of the American Revolutionary War, eleven of the Thirteen Colonies evicted (with varying levels of violence) royal and proprietary governors.

Administered by the federal government, they had governors who were appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate rather than elected by the resident population.

Four Democrats (including the Mayor of the District of Columbia), one Independent, and one New Progressive also occupy territorial governorships or mayorships.

On December 14, 2015, he became the longest-serving governor in US history, breaking the record held by George Clinton of New York, who served 21 years from 1777 to 1795 and from 1801 to 1804.

In the majority of states and territories, term limit laws officially cap a governor's tenure.

The youngest current state governor is Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas, who was born on (1982-08-13) August 13, 1982 (age 42).

The youngest person to ever serve as a governor in the United States was Stevens T. Mason of the Michigan Territory, first elected in 1835 having just turned 24.

Vermont requires candidates to be residents of the state for at least four years as of Election Day, which would preclude small children from running, but has no other implicit or explicit age limit.

The 12 female governors are: Kay Ivey of Alabama, Katie Hobbs of Arizona, Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas, Kim Reynolds of Iowa, Laura Kelly of Kansas, Janet Mills of Maine, Maura Healey of Massachusetts, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico, Kathy Hochul of New York, and Tina Kotek of Oregon.

Of those, Ayotte, Huckabee Sanders, Ivey, and Reynolds are Republicans, while Healey, Hobbs, Hochul, Kelly, Kotek, Lujan Grisham, Mills, and Whitmer are Democrats.

New Hampshire has also had female governors from two parties, but Republican Vesta M. Roy served only in the acting capacity for a short time.

14 women have been serving as chief executive of their states since January 9, 2025, when Kelly Ayotte was inaugurated as governor of New Hampshire.

This beats the record of 13 set just days earlier following Bethany Hall-Long's inauguration as Governor of Delaware on January 7, 2025.

There are currently three governors from the LGBTQ community: Jared Polis (Colorado), who is gay, and Tina Kotek (Oregon) and Maura Healey (Massachusetts) who are lesbians.

[11] Ethnic minorities as defined by the United States Census currently constitute 38.9% of the total population of the U.S. as of 2018.

There are 3 minority governors: Wes Moore of Maryland, who is black, Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico, who is of Hispanic descent; and Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma, who is a member of the Cherokee Nation.

Alabama Governor Robert J. Bentley refused his yearly salary of $119,950.00 until the state reached full employment.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has returned his salary to the state during each year he has held office.

Only nine states (Massachusetts,[14] California, Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina,[15] and Virginia) currently offer their governors a higher salary than the $174,000 paid to members of Congress.

[citation needed] All states except for Louisiana hold gubernatorial elections on the first Tuesday following the first Monday in November.