Mar 22

JET alum David Boling to run for Congress

Career, Celebrity, Uncategorized Comments Off on JET alum David Boling to run for Congress

Thanks to JET alum Harlan Rosacker of Washington, D.C. for passing along this information:

JET alum David Boling has announced his candidacy for the 2^nd Congressional seat in Arkansas.   You can see David’s website at:  www.bolingforcongress.com and you can follow his blog at:  www.bolingforcongress.com/blog.html.

Harland adds:

“We have known David since the mid-1990s.  Our association grew as a result our having lived in Japan ourselves from 1969 to 1976.   Our son Andrew (born in Tokyo) was a JET in Kanagawa-ken from 1996 to 1998.”

Here are a few JET-relevant snippets from David’s bio:

• David Boling, 45, is a fourth-generation Arkansan. He is a 10-year veteran of the U.S. Department of Justice; a one-time lawyer at the Mitchell Williams law firm in Little Rock; and, until last month, the Chief of Staff to Congressman Vic Snyder (D, AR-2).
• Boling is married to former Fuji Television reporter Mine Sasaguri; he and his wife are the parents of two children, Christopher (7) and Ellen (5).
• Fulfilling a desire to learn more about the Japanese educational system, David took a one-year break from law school, 1988-1989, to teach English to students in Fujishiro. He was later selected for a competitive Rotary scholarship which he used to master the 1800 character Japanese language, visit Pine Bluff’s Sister City, Iwai and, most importantly, gain an understanding of the Japanese legal system and trade between Japan and the United States – specifically, about trade between Japan and Arkansas.
• David passed the Arkansas Bar Exam in 1993 and then completed a Masters in Law (LL.M) at Columbia University School of Law in 1994, where he focused on international and Japanese law.
• In 1995, David joined the US Department of Justice Antitrust Division as a lawyer. He worked there for 10 years, spanning both the Clinton and Bush Administrations. As they increasingly litigated cases against Japanese firms, David’s background was a strong asset to the Justice Department, but he also worked to investigate alleged illegal monopoly behavior in the concert ticketing business and on criminal investigations to crack down on international price-fixing cartels, which steal from American consumers. He helped prosecute a Japanese executive and Japanese company for obstruction of justice in two separate antitrust investigations. In 1999, Janet Reno signed an international antitrust agreement between Japan and the US to further open the Japanese market and improve antitrust enforcement that Boling helped to negotiate.
• Boling was selected for a Mike Mansfield Fellowship at Justice, during which he worked in the Japanese Justice Ministry and other government agencies, deepening his understanding of their legal system.

David-san, ganbatte kudasai!