Richard Neal

Richard Edmund Neal (born February 14, 1949) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for Massachusetts's 1st congressional district since 1989. The district, numbered as the 2nd district from 1989 to 2013, includes Springfield, West Springfield, Pittsfield, Holyoke, Agawam, Chicopee and Westfield, and is much more rural than the rest of the state. A member of the Democratic Party, Neal has been the dean of Massachusetts's delegation to the United States House of Representatives since 2013, and he is also the dean of the New England House delegations. Neal was president of the Springfield City Council from 1979 to 1983, serving as mayor of Springfield from 1983 to 1989. He was nearly unopposed when he ran for the House of Representatives in 1988, and took office in 1989. Neal has chaired the House Ways and Means Committee since 2019 and chaired the Subcommittee on Select Revenue Measures. He has also dedicated much of his career to U.S.–Ireland relations and maintaining American involvement in the Northern Ireland peace process, for which he has won several acclamations. He has a generally liberal voting record, but is considered a moderate on such issues as abortion and trade. In January 2020, Neal was inducted into the Irish American Hall of Fame.