Steve Henry

Steve Henry (born 1953) was a Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky from 1995 through 2003. He twice ran in statewide elections, finishing third in Democratic primaries for the United States Senate in 1998 and for Governor of Kentucky in 2007.

Early years
Henry was born in Daviess County, Kentucky. He attended Western Kentucky University and then became a surgeon in Louisville, Kentucky. While in Louisville he was elected to the Jefferson County, Kentucky Fiscal Court as a Democrat District Commissioner.

Lieutenant governor
In 1995 Paul E. Patton, then Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky, selected Henry as his running mate for Patton's campaign for governor. Due to a 1992 amendment to the Kentucky Constitution, 1995 was the first year in which candidates for Governor and Lieutenant Governor ran together as a slate in Kentucky. Patton and Henry won the election with 500,605 votes (50.9%) to 479,227 (48.7%) for the Republican nominees, Larry Forgy and Tom Handy. During the 1995 campaign, due to complaints that Henry ran up charges for telephone calls related to his campaign that were made out of his county office, Henry repaid the county for those calls.

In 1998 Henry ran for the United States Senate seat being vacated by Wendell H. Ford. Henry finished third in the Democratic primary with 156,576 votes (27.6%) to 166,472 votes (29.3%) for former federal prosecutor Charlie Owen and 194,125 votes (34.2%) for eventual nominee Congressman Scotty Baesler. Baesler narrowly lost the general election to Republican Jim Bunning.

In 1999 there was considerable speculation that Patton would drop Henry from the ticket, and Patton considered dropping Henry, but the two ran again and won re-election with 352,099 votes, 60.6% of the total in a very low turnout, defeating the Republican ticket of Peppy Martin and Wanda Cornelius.

While serving as lieutenant governor, Henry married 2000 Miss America Heather French Henry. The wedding led to controversy over state resources being expended as part of the wedding and planning (see below).

In 2002 Henry advocated legislation that would mandate healthier lunch options for Kentucky school children and limit junk food in public schools.

Henry served as Lieutenant Governor until late 2003, when Steve Pence was elected on the Republican ticket and succeeded Henry.

Controversy
In 2002 and 2003 it emerged that the United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky was investigating Henry for fraudulent Medicare and Medicaid billings while he taught at the University of Louisville Medical School from 1996 through 2001.

Then-United States Attorney Steve Pence had previously stated that he would not seek an indictment in regards to a criminal case, but the federal government pursued a civil case to attempt repayment. Henry countersued claiming that the University of Louisville employees had verified his presence at the procedures before he had signed the papers. In 2003 Henry settled the federal lawsuit by paying the federal government $162,000.

In a 2006 editorial by the Courier Journal, the newspaper questioned Henry's past record of billing errors. In 2000 and 2001 Steve Henry repaid the state for numerous improper charges. He blamed a Kentucky State Police trooper for his hotel stay during a beauty pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey being charged to a state credit card. Henry was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 2000; Henry ended up repaying $4,327 to the state for personal expenses of his that were charged to the state for he and his wife.

Later, he repaid the state $491 for personal telephone calls he made from his state office. Henry also repaid the state $1,804 for almost 1,000 photos and video tapes made of him over a nine month period, including his wedding, that were made by state employees. He also repaid the state $1,800 for press packets for his wedding that were made by state employees at taxpayer expense. Henry also charged a four night stay during two beauty pageants in a Lexington, Kentucky hotel - just 30 miles from the lieutenant governor's mansion - to the state.

On March 16 2007 Leslie Holland, a former employee of Henry, filed a complaint with the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance stating that Henry broke state laws when he used a federal campaign account to spend money on his race for the state office of governor and used illegal corporate contributions for that purpose. This came shortly after the Office of the United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky acknowledged having received information pertaining to violations of federal campaign finance laws by Henry and his campaign entities.

In June 2007 it was reported that Henry was dismissed from the University of Louisville hospital faculty because of concerns about his attendance and performance and related liability problems. This came after his campaign for governor falsely claimed, among other things, that Henry still performed surgery at the hospital.

2007 candidacy for governor
In the 2007 election for Governor of Kentucky Henry ran for Governor of Kentucky. Early polls showed him at or near the head of the pack in the Democratic primary due to name recognition. However, Henry finished third in the primary with just over 60,00 votes (17%), behind Bruce Lunsford's 21% and winner Steve Beshear's 41% (over 142,000 votes)

On election night Henry conceded and pledged his support to Beshear for the general election.