Free Republic

1. Jeri Kehn was born on Sept. 30, 1966, in Hastings, Neb. Her family moved to Naperville, Ill., when she was 3. Growing up, Jeri spent summers on her grandparents' farm in Nebraska. 2. Her parents divorced when she was around 12. Her mother, Vicki, a librarian, married Ronald Keller, a music teacher, about three years after her divorce. 3. Jeri is a 1984 graduate of Naperville North High School. While at Naperville North, she was a member of the school's dance squad, the Starlettes. During Jeri's junior year of high school, the Starlettes won the state championship. 4. She...

Greencastle, Ind. - "Four years ago in this cycle there was a front-runner and his name was Howard Dean," recalls Jeri Kehn Thompson, in an interview with Kentucky's Lexington Herald-Leader. "John Kerry was running about eighth. You can ask President Dean how things went in Iowa." Thompson, a 1988 graduate of DePauw University, is the wife of Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson, who is currently running third among GOP candidates in an Iowa poll. She was in Louisville campaigning for her husband yesterday. The article notes that Jeri Thompson returned home to Washington immediately following her Kentucky stop so she...

Vicki Keller was on her way out the door Wednesday when she was asked about her son-in-law's imminent run for the White House. "I don't know what there is to say, really," said the Naperville resident as she headed to Des Moines, Iowa, with her husband, Ron. The couple planned to be with Jeri Kehn, Vicki's daughter, at midnight, when Kehn's husband, Fred Thompson, officially planned to become the newest addition to the GOP presidential race. Although published reports said Kehn, 40, has been urging Thompson, 65, to toss his hat in the ring and is active behind the scenes,...

Presidential candidates always make a big deal of the advice they get from their wives. Ronald Reagan told voters that Nancy was his closest adviser; Bill Clinton said Hillary was so crucial to his team that electing him would be a "two-for-one" deal. On the trail, John Edwards and Barack Obama showcase their smart, outspoken spouses. Politicians seem to think it humanizes them—and increases their appeal to women voters—to come off as just a little henpecked. Fred Thompson has his own version of the shtick. Speaking at a fund-raiser last week, he introduced Jeri Kehn Thompson as "my campaign manager—oh,...

One Friday afternoon last month, Jeri Kehn Thompson took attendance at the testing-the-waters presidential campaign headquarters of her husband, Fred D. Thompson. Mrs. Thompson checked to see which staff members were working at their desks, said a Republican close to the campaign, and went on to chide those who were A.W.O.L. The spot-check is just one of many indications that Mrs. Thompson, a former political consultant herself, is taking an active, hands-on role in the effort to propel Mr. Thompson, a former Tennessee senator, into a presidential candidacy. Admirers say the role makes sense, not only because of her background...

Political analysts widely regard Fred Thompson as a potential, if not likely, candidate in the United States presidential election in 2008. Thompson is a lawyer, lobbyist, character actor and former Republican Senator for Tennessee now residing in McLean, Virginia near Washington D.C. A recent article in The New York Times (NYT) labelled his wife, Jeri Kehn Thompson as a "trophy wife" and a potential liability in the 2008 race. The NYT article described her as having "youthfulness, permanent tan and bleached blonde hair" and wonders if "so-called values voters" would "accept this union." Thompson and Kehn, married in June 2002,...

"Stripper." "Bimbo." "Permanently tan." These are just a few of the adjectives used in the media lately to describe Jeri Kehn Thompson. She's the wife of likely Republican presidential candidate and former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson, and one of the latest women to have characteristics associated with "trophy wives." Thompson joins the ranks of other notable women who have been referred to as trophy wives, like Donald Trump's ex-wife Marla Maples and the late Anna Nicole Smith. But is she really a trophy wife? Though she's blond, beautiful and nearly 25 years younger than her husband, Kehn Thompson, a political...