Governor of Montana
Board Member: Governors
Steve Bullock, Montana’s former attorney general, was elected Montana’s 24th governor on November 6, 2012.
Bullock, 46, has served as Montana attorney general since January of 2009. He pioneered the successful Montana 24/7 Sobriety Program, which holds repeat drunken drivers accountable by allowing judges to order offenders to take twice-daily breath tests or wear alcohol-monitoring bracelets. Bullock worked with Democrats and Republicans in the 2011 Legislature to expand the program statewide. To date, more than 115,000 tests have been administered with a 99.7 percent success rate. The program is paid for by the offenders.
Bullock also worked to curb prescription drug abuse, cited in more Montana deaths than heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine combined. He has dispersed dozens of grants to local communities to build permanent prescription drug drop boxes. In the 2011 Legislature, Bullock spearheaded the successful effort to pass a bill creating a prescription drug monitoring program, joining more than 40 other states that already operate such programs. The registry went online this fall.
A father of three young children, Bullock also made the safety of Montana’s kids a top priority. He more than doubled the number of statewide law enforcement officers patrolling the Internet, improved the Montana Sexual or Violent Offender Registry and hired a prosecutor focused solely on child sex abuse cases.
Bullock was born in Missoula and raised in Helena. He attended public schools in Helena and graduated from Helena High School in 1984. He received his undergraduate degree from Claremont McKenna College and his law degree with honors from Columbia University Law School in New York.
Bullock began his career in public service in 1996 as chief legal counsel to the Montana Secretary of State, before moving to the Montana Department of Justice. As an assistant attorney general, Bullock wrote the opinion that guaranteed public access to Montana’s publicly owned streams and rivers.
Bullock and his wife Lisa have three children: Caroline, Alexandria and Cameron. He enjoys hiking with his family and trying to keep up with his kids.