James Robert Duggar (born July 18, 1965) is an American real estate agent, politician, and television personality, known for the reality series ''

19 Kids and Counting ''19 Kids and Counting'' (formerly ''17 Kids and Counting'' and ''18 Kids and Counting'') is an American reality television series that aired on the cable channel TLC (TV network), TLC for seven years until its cancellation in 2015. The show f ...

,'' which aired from 2008 to 2015. From 1999 to 2003, he was a Republican member of the

Arkansas House of Representatives The Arkansas State House of Representatives is the lower house of the Arkansas General Assembly, the state legislature of the US state of Arkansas. The House is composed of 100 members elected from an equal amount of constituencies across the ...

Early life

Duggar was born in Springdale, now the fourth largest city in

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the Osage ...

, the son of James Lee "Jimmy Lee" Duggar (1936–2009) and the former Mary Lester (1941–2019), who owned a real estate brokerage agency. Duggar has an older sister, Deanna (b. 1962). He graduated from

Shiloh Christian School Shiloh Christian School is a private Christian school in Springdale, Arkansas, United States. History Shiloh Christian School was founded in 1976 as a ministry of the First Baptist Church of Springdale, by Dennis Cottrell and Tom Ellis, under th ...

Career

Duggar is a licensed realtor and owns several commercial properties in his local area as an investor.

Political career

From 1999 to 2003, Duggar served in the

for District 6, which was located in northern Washington County. He first won election in 1998, defeating Kathy McFetridge with 56% of the vote. He was re-elected by a wider margin in 2000. Duggar was vice chair of the House Corrections and Criminal Law Subcommittee and also participated in the committees on Insurance and Commerce and Judiciary. In 2002, rather than seeking reelection to the state House, Duggar ran unsuccessfully in the Republican

primary election Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the ...

for the

United States Senate The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and pow ...

. He was defeated by the

incumbent The incumbent is the current holder of an official, office or position, usually in relation to an election. In an election for president, the incumbent is the person holding or acting in the office of president before the election, whether seek ...

Senator Tim Hutchinson by a lopsided vote of 71,576 to 20,546. In 2006, Duggar unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for the District 35 seat in the Arkansas State Senate. He lost to his opponent, Bill Pritchard, by two hundred votes. In 2021, Duggar announced his second candidacy for the State Senate, now running in the 7th District. The election was triggered after the incumbent Republican, Lance Eads, resigned. Duggar finished third out of four candidates in the Republican primary, with 15.3% of the vote.

Marriage and children

On July 21, 1984, Duggar married Michelle Annette Ruark. Together, the couple has 19 children: Joshua ("Josh") (b. 1988), twins Jana and John-David (b. 1990),

Jill Jill is an English feminine given name, a short form of the name Jillian (Gillian), which in turn originates as a Middle English variant of Juliana, the feminine form of the name Julian. People with the given name *Jill Astbury, Australian res ...

(b. 1991), Jessa (b. 1992), Jinger (b. 1993), Joseph (b. 1995), Josiah (b. 1996), Joy-Anna (b. 1997), twins Jedidiah and Jeremiah (b. 1998), Jason (b. 2000), James (b. 2001), Justin (b. 2002), Jackson (b. 2004), Johannah (b. 2005), Jennifer (b. 2007), Jordyn (b. 2008), and Josie (b. 2009). Duggar and his wife also have permanent guardianship of his wife's great-nephew Tyler Hutchins (b. 2008), since November 2016. The family was featured on the reality series ''

'' from 2008 to 2015. Duggar and his family are

Independent Baptist Independent Baptist churches (some also called Independent Fundamental Baptist or IFB) are Christian congregations, generally holding to conservative (primarily fundamentalist) Baptist beliefs. Although some Independent Baptist churches refuse af ...

Christians Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

. They are members of the

Institute in Basic Life Principles The Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP) is a nondenominational Christian fundamentalist organization that serves as an umbrella organization for several ministries established by American Christian minister Bill Gothard in 1961. The stat ...

organization (aka IBLP and Advanced Training Institute), a homeschooling program run by Christian minister

Bill Gothard William W. Gothard Jr. (born November 2, 1934) is an American Christian minister, speaker, and writer, and the founder of the Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP), an ultra-conservative Christian organization. His conservative teachings ...

. Duggar's oldest daughter, Jana Duggar, is a leader at the IBLP's "Journey to the Heart" youth ministry.

Josh Duggar molestation report

In 2006, Jim Bob Duggar told the Arkansas State Police that his oldest son, Josh, had molested five underage girls,Josh Duggar sex scandal reported
, intouchweekly.com; accessed May 22, 2015. including family members, in the early 2000s when he was 14–15 years old. The alleged abuse involved touching their breast and genital regions on multiple occasions while they slept and in a few cases while they were awake. Jim Bob Duggar had been prompted to speak to police after producers of ''

The Oprah Winfrey Show ''The Oprah Winfrey Show'', often referred to as ''The Oprah Show'' or simply ''Oprah'', is an American daytime broadcast syndication, syndicated talk show that aired nationally for 25 seasons from September 8, 1986, to May 25, 2011, in Chicag ...

'' told authorities they had received allegations against Josh Duggar. Jim Bob Duggar told police he had referred his son to a program consisting of physical labor and counseling after consulting with the leadership of his church. Michelle Duggar stated their son was sent away from home to work for a family friend in the home remodeling business. Upon the son's return home, the father took him to Arkansas State Trooper Jim Hutchens, a family acquaintance, who reportedly gave him a "stern talk". The three-year statute of limitations had expired when the allegations were reported, and Josh Duggar was not formally charged with any crime. The public did not learn about this until 2015, when Josh Duggar's public admission of his behavior caused TLC to cancel the reality show ''19 Kids and Counting''. In a joint statement to ''

People A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...

'' magazine following the public revelation, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar said: "Even though we would never choose to go through something so terrible, each one of our family members drew closer to God. We pray that as people watch our lives they see that we are not a perfect family. We have challenges and struggles every day." TLC rebooted the Duggar's reality show as ''Counting On'' later in 2015, focusing on the older Duggar children and their spouses and children. This show, too, was canceled in 2021 after Josh Duggar was arrested. On December 9, 2021, Josh Duggar was convicted of receiving and possessing child pornography.

Books

Duggar and his wife have written two books together, both published by Howard Books. The first is titled ''The Duggars: 20 and Counting!'', which was released on December 2, 2008. Their second is ''A Love That Multiplies'', which was released June 7, 2011.

Other political activities

In 2008, Duggar and his wife endorsed former

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

Mike Huckabee Michael Dale Huckabee (born August 24, 1955) is an American politician, Baptist minister, and political commentator who served as the 44th governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007. He was a candidate for the Republican Party presidential nomina ...

in his campaign for the Republican presidential primaries. In January 2012, the Duggars endorsed Republican former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum of

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

for president.

Electoral history

References

External links

Duggar family website
*
Arkansas House of Representatives page (archived from November 2002)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Duggar, Jim Bob 1965 births Living people American investors American real estate brokers American television writers American male television writers Baptists from Arkansas Businesspeople from Arkansas Duggar family Republican Party members of the Arkansas House of Representatives Participants in American reality television series People from Springdale, Arkansas Writers from Arkansas People from Washington County, Arkansas Screenwriters from Arkansas Conservatism in the United States 20th-century American politicians 21st-century American politicians