A Democrat, he was elected in 1978 as district attorney, in which capacity he acquired the sobriquet "Maximum John" for his vigorous prosecution of crime and demand for lengthy sentences.

[1] On leaving the Senate, he became the first chancellor of the newly established Texas Tech University System,[4] a position which he maintained for five years until 2001.

Instead, donors contributed $500 million, which allowed for construction of the United Spirit Arena and renovations to Jones AT&T Stadium and several academic buildings.

Montford said that Texans are already traveling to Louisiana, New Mexico, and Oklahoma to gamble, and the state should earmark those otherwise lost revenues to public use.

He pushed for the establishment of the UTSA Presidents Dinner, which in 2007 raised $4.6 million, a large bonanza for a commuter educational institution.

General Motors retained his firm as a consultant, in which assignment Montford was the senior advisor of government relations and global public policy until January 2012.

Mindy Montford, as she is known, lost a high-profile Democratic primary race in 2008 for district attorney of Travis County to succeed her then-boss, Ronnie Earle.

[11] In 2010, Governor Rick Perry appointed Debra Montford, a native of Littlefield in Lamb County, to the Texas Tech board of regents to a term that extends until 2017.