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Randal Howard Paul (born January 7, 1963) is an American physician and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Kentucky since 2011. A member of the Republican Party, he is a son of former three-time presidential candidate and 12-term U.S. representative from Texas, Ron Paul. Paul describes himself as a constitutional conservative and supporter of the Tea Party movement. Paul attended Baylor University and is a graduate of the Duke University School of Medicine. Paul was a practicing ophthalmologist in Bowling Green, Kentucky, from 1993 until his election to the Senate in 2010. He was re-elected to a second term in 2016, and won a third term in 2022. Paul was a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. He ended his campaign in February 2016 after finishing in fifth place during the Iowa caucuses. While he initially opposed Donald Trump during the 2016 Republican primaries, he supported him following his nomination and became one of his top defenders in the U.S. Senate during his first impeachment trial, though on key votes Paul aligned with Trump the third least among Republican senators during Trump's presidency. Randal Howard Paul was born on January 7, 1963, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Carol (née Wells) and Ron Paul, who is also a politician and physician. The middle child of five, his siblings are Ronald "Ronnie" Paul Jr., Lori Paul Pyeatt, Robert Paul, and Joy Paul LeBlanc. Paul was baptized in the Episcopal Church and identified as a practicing Christian as a teenager. Despite his father's libertarian views and strong support for individual rights, the novelist Ayn Rand was not the inspiration for his first name. Growing up, he went by "Randy", but his wife shortened it to "Rand." The Paul family moved to Lake Jackson, Texas in 1968, where he was raised and where his father began a medical practice and for a period of time was the only obstetrician in Brazoria County. When Rand was 13, his father Ron Paul was elected to the United States House of Representatives.
