Lisa Posthumus Lyons

Lisa Posthumus Lyons (born June 12, 1980) is an American politician from Alto, Michigan, and served three terms as a Republican member of the Michigan House of Representatives from District 86 (portions of Ionia and Kent Counties) from 2011 - 2016. In 2016 she was elected Kent County Clerk[1] / Register of Deeds.[2]

Lisa Posthumus
Clerk and Register of Deeds of Kent County
Assumed office
January 1, 2017
Preceded byMary Hollinrake
Member of the Michigan House of Representatives
from the 86th district
In office
January 1, 2011 – December 31, 2016
Preceded byDave Hildenbrand
Succeeded byThomas Albert
Personal details
Born
Lisa Posthumus

(1980-06-12) June 12, 1980
Alto, Michigan, U.S.
Political partyRepublican
Spouse(s)Brad Lyons
Children4
EducationMichigan State University (BS)

The only woman to hold countywide office in Kent County, Michigan, Lyons was named by the Grand Rapids Business Journal as one of The 50 Most Influential Women[3] in West Michigan in 2018.

She is the daughter of Dick Posthumus, who served as Lieutenant Governor of Michigan from 1999 to 2003 and was the Republican nominee for governor in 2002.

Background

Posthumus Lyons describes herself as the fourth generation to own their family's family farm in Alto. She graduated from Lowell High School and from Michigan State University with a bachelor's degree in Agricultural and Natural Resources Communications. Prior to elected office, Lyons was Director of Public Policy & Community Outreach for the Grand Rapids Association of Realtors. Lyons and her husband Brad, who is a deputy sheriff in Kent County, have four children: Easton, Charlie, Gage, and Fisher.

Michigan House of Representatives

In the 2010 general election, Posthumus Lyons beat Frank Hammond with 25,943 votes, to 10,996 for Hammond and 909 for Libertarian Robin VanLoon. She was subsequently re-elected in 2012 and 2014. During her tenure, she chaired the House standing committees on education and on ethics and elections, and authored 32 Public Acts[4] that were signed into law. Posthumus Lyons was term-limited in 2016 after serving three terms.

Kent County, Michigan

In the 2016 General Election, Lyons was elected to the combined office of Kent County Clerk / Register of Deeds with 158,341 votes to Democratic Party candidate Christopher Reader's 115,244 votes, and Libertarian candidate James Lewis' 16,017 votes. She began her four-year term of office in January 2017.

The Kent County Clerk's Office has three major functions:[5] to manage County elections; to manage vital County records; and to process and maintain all Circuit Court files. In Kent County, the Clerk is also the Register of Deeds. The Clerk is also the Clerk of the Board of Commissioners, and statutorily serves on numerous County boards and commissions.

2018 Michigan Gubernatorial Campaign
Main article: 2018 Michigan gubernatorial election

On August 15, 2018, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette announced[6] Lyons as his running mate for his gubernatorial campaign. Her nomination was confirmed by the Michigan Republican State Convention on August 25, 2018[7] and she officially joined the Republican ticket as candidate for Lieutenant Governor of the State of Michigan. The pair lost the general election on November 6, 2018 to the Democratic ticket of Gretchen Whitmer and Garlin Gilchrist.

Controversies
  • In 2012, after supporting a right-to-work law, Lisa Posthumus Lyons went on to propose an amendment exempting corrections officers. Her husband, Brad Lyons, was a corrections officer at that time.[8] Her response to the alleged conflict of interest was that Democrats have suggested the same sort of legislation in the past, and that her constituency includes hundreds of corrections officers.[9]
  • In June 2013, during a school dissolution bill debate, Lisa Posthumus Lyons made the remark "Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered" in response to the request that surrounding districts interview the teachers from the dissolving school.[10][11] Many considered her remarks disproportionate to the request, and a former teacher of hers sent a letter condemning her use of the phrase.[12] Her response to criticism was that her remarks were meant for lobbyists (the teachers' union) and not the teachers themselves.[10]

Electoral history
Michigan gubernatorial election, 2018[13][14]
Party Candidate Votes % ±
Democratic Gretchen Whitmer
Garlin Gilchrist 		2,256,791 53.34% +6.48%
Republican Bill Schuette
Lisa Posthumus Lyons		 1,853,650 43.81% -7.11%
Libertarian Bill Gelineau
Angelique Chaiser Thomas		 56,752 1.34% +0.21%
Constitution Todd Schleiger
Earl P. Lackie		 24,701 0.58% -0.03%
Green Jennifer V. Kurland
Charin H. Davenport		 28,857 0.68% +0.21%
Natural Law Keith Butkovitch
Raymond Warner		 10,258 0.24% -
Majority 403,141 9.53% +5.47%
Turnout 4,231,009 34.04%
Swing to Democratic from Republican Swing

References
  1. "Kent County Clerk website". Kent County Register of Deeds.
  2. "Kent County Register of Deeds website". Kent County, Michigan.
  3. "The 50 Most Influential Women in West Michigan - 2018". Issuu. Retrieved 2018-08-16.
  4. "The 50 Most Influential Women in West Michigan - 2018". Issuu. Retrieved 2018-08-16.
  5. "Kent County Clerk website". Kent County Clerk.
  6. "GOP governor nominee Bill Schuette names Lisa Lyons as running mate - Detroit Free Press".
  7. Sanford, Rod (2018-08-25). "Michigan GOP convention [Detroit News]". Detroit News. Retrieved 2018-10-17.
  8. "State Rep. Lisa Posthumus Lyons tried to exempt husband from right-to-work law". MLive.com.
  9. "State Rep. Lisa Posthumus Lyons: Corrections officers should be treated same as police, firefighters in right-to-work law (Guest column)". MLive.com.
  10. "Rep. Lyons issues statement on 'pigs' remark during school dissolution bill debate". MLive.com.
  11. "Rep. Lisa Posthumus Lyons speaking on HB-4813". YouTube.
  12. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2014-07-25. Retrieved 2014-07-19.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  13. https://mielections.us/election/results/2018GEN_CENR.html
  14. http://www.lwvoa.org/files/LWVOAFullVoterGuideNovember2018-compressed.pdf
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