Board Member
School Board Member
Mounds View, MN
Jim DeMay is a noted political strategist and community advocate. He started his political career as Administrative Aide to the Minneapolis Council President. He received a City Proclamation for Exceptional Service to Minneapolis in 1991.
In 1991, he was hired for Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton’s New Hampshire Primary staff serving in several states as a field director. DeMay led Clinton’s 1996 re-election efforts successfully in the battleground state of Ohio. He served in the Clinton Administration as a Special Assistant to Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown. In 1994-95, he organized the Committee of Ukrainian Voters to monitor the first free elections in Ukraine for the Democratic Institute of International Affairs (NDI). He has served as an International Election Monitor and political party trainer in several elections based in the former Soviet Union.
DeMay continued in Presidential politics leading Vice President Gore’s 2000 Presidential campaign in Pennsylvania. He was on the Rules Committee of the Democratic National Convention in 2000. In 2002, Campaigns and Elections Magazine named him a “Rising Star” in American Politics.
DeMay returned to the Presidential field in 2004 serving the John Kerry Campaign for President again in Ohio. The Obama for President had DeMay return to Pennsylvania in 2008 for the primary and was a Senior Advisor to the campaign during the general election.
DeMay has served the Minnesota DFL party as a Precinct Chair, Central Committee and Executive Committee member. He was a Senior Advisor to DFL Chair Mike Erlandson. In 2005, he received the party’s Hubert H. Humphrey Award for dedication and leadership to the party.
DeMay has a strong history of community service with a focus on education. DeMay was elected to the Mounds View (MN) Public School Board in 2019 and re-elected in 2023. He is active on the Board of the Association of Metropolitan School Districts. He is a former Adjunct Professor of Public Administration at Hamline University and continued for many years on their advisory council.
DeMay has a B.A. in Economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an M.A. in Public Administration from Hamline University (Saint Paul). DeMay and his wife Channing Riggs have been married 27 years and raised their two children in Minnesota. DeMay enjoys cooking, music, tennis, and anything Italian.