Virginia Foxx not done making waves as the 'Iron Lady' of the House GOP

From elevator-bound staffers to the top leaders in the House, no one is underestimating 82-year-old Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.).

After Foxx chaired a nearly 22-hour House Rules Committee hearing ahead of House passage of Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” in May, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) called her the “Iron Lady of the House.” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) called Foxx a “tough cookie” and a “straight shooter” in a press conference a few weeks later.

Now in her 11th term in Congress, Foxx is undeniably one of the most iconic figures in the House Republican Conference — a stature achieved not by making waves through social media or bombastic stances, but through being a workhorse and a team player.

“I am really, really focused on not wasting time,” Foxx said in an interview with The Hill in June. “If you see me when I'm waiting for the train, you'll see I go to the end of the platform so that I am on the first car, so when I get out, I'm as close as I can be to where I'm going.”

But while she is known for her toughness, Foxx also has a soft side — tearing up when talking about the American Revolution’s “barefoot soldiers who were willing to risk their lives for freedom.” She’s poured her energy through her decades-long career into helping people through education, just as it helped her rise up from poverty. 

Fox in this Congress is the only Republican woman chairing a committee in the House, selected by the Speaker to lead the powerful Rules panel after she led Republicans on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce for four terms. 

Foxx, though, doesn’t see that statistic as evidence of bias against women in the GOP.

“I think a lot of the press tries to make it look like women are not respected in the Republican Party, but it's really a matter of tenure,” she said, adding: “The fact that I'm the only woman just means that we haven't had women stay as long as men stay or start earlier to be able to gain the seniority to become a chair. So it's just a matter of timing, more than anything.”

Foxx’s personal life story centers on the transformative power of education.

Born in New York City (Manhattan, to be exact — “Wikipedia has it wrong”), Foxx moved to North Carolina when she was six years old, living in houses without electricity or running water. She had no plans to go to college until a teacher her senior year encouraged her to do so.

She attended Lees-McRae College in North Carolina for a semester; then went to live with her grandparents in the Bronx while she worked as a typist near Wall Street and saved her money; and then went back to enroll at Appalachian State University. Foxx transferred and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and went on to earn an education doctorate from UNC-Greensboro.

But Foxx stresses that benefiting from education is not about collecting college degrees, but about skill development. She recalled her younger brother worrying that his family would be ashamed of him for not wanting to go to college. Foxx helped set up a carpentry apprenticeship program for him to enter, and he eventually got a license.

“We've set a standard for many people that says if you don't have a college degree, you're no good. And that bothers me a lot,” Foxx said.

Foxx is as much of a team player on the political side of the House GOP as she is within the official side. One of the booths in the National Republican Congressional Committee from which members make fundraising calls has Foxx’s name on it, sources have told The Hill over the years.

Those workhorse sensibilities have long been apparent: A profile of Foxx in The Hill 20 years ago described Foxx’s personality as “half-grandmother, half-drill sergeant.”

Around the Capitol campus, Foxx is widely known for her reputation for scolding staff and others for hopping on a members-only elevator, or telling staff and reporters to get out of the way.

"I am a rule follower. Ninety-five percent of the time, I'm in a hurry, and most members are,” Foxx said. “And so there's a members’ elevator for a reason, and it really is for time management more than anything else.”

Her elevator reputation is so strong that other members have thanked her for the installation of new members-only elevators updates in House office buildings over the last year — but Foxx said the credit for those new key-card activated elevators to House Administration Committee Chair Bryan Steil (R-Wis.), insisting she did not ask for the additions.

It's not just elevators. Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.), one of Foxx's friends in Congress, recalled one of his first impressions of her while waiting on a bus to go to an event.

"This white-haired lady stood up and told the bus driver, 'close the door and go,'" Westerman said. "And the bus driver closed the door and left. And my wife and I were there, and my wife said, 'You better watch out for her.'"

"There's only one Virginia Foxx," he added. "I think a lot of people see sometimes a rough exterior, but she's got a huge heart inside."

Foxx also made waves when she scolded a reporter in a press conference after Republicans nominated Johnson to be Speaker after a three-month saga following former Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) removal in 2023. One of the first questions to Johnson concerned his efforts supporting Trump’s “Stop the Steal” effort after the 2020 election.

Republicans booed — and Foxx, standing prominently next to Johnson, shouted back: “Shut up! Shut up!”

Foxx told The Hill she thought the questions should have centered on how the new Speaker nominee felt.

“We were in such a wonderful mood. We'd gone through a lot to get speaker Johnson elected, and the mood in the room was so happy, so happy. And for somebody to bring up something totally opposite of where we were at the moment was very frustrating,” Foxx said. “The woman was clueless about the tone at the time.”

Foxx, who just celebrated her 82nd birthday, is the 15th oldest lawmaker in all of Congress — and the 10th oldest representative.

Age has become a major political liability in recent years, particularly with former President Biden being forced to drop out of the 2024 race due to concerns about his mental acuity and a number of other aging lawmakers being scrutinized more regularly.

Foxx is “quite aware” of the scrutiny placed on older members, but sees herself as being at the peak of her career and has no plans to step back. In May, she announced she is seeking reelection in 2026.

“I get letters from people saying you need to quit,” Foxx said. “My response to that is the Speaker appointed me Chair of the Rules Committee. That's sort of the peak of a career around here. And so I feel like I'm really in a good place. I don't think anybody will say I have any cognitive decline.”

“I’m physically in good shape. I had a fall in January, but that was because of a slick step,” Foxx said, referring to slipping on the marble steps outside the House chamber. “I don't have any problems with getting around and I feel great. I work out every day, I stretch and I do those kinds of things to keep in good shape.”

“I don't see a reason to quit, as long as I can be the kind of representative my constituents deserve and want,” Foxx said.

Last year, Foxx went through the same personal hardships as many of her constituents when Hurricane Helene hit North Carolina — trapping her husband in their mountain home.

Foxx told her husband she planned to stay the night in Winston-Salem due to the coming hurricane and meetings in the area the next day, but he didn’t expect the storm to be that bad. But Foxx, not wanting to take chances, filled up jugs of water for him – preparedness that paid off after flooding washed away some driveway to her house, trapping him for several days.

“I’m glad in many ways that it happened to us, because we were experiencing the same things that my constituents were experiencing. So when people would call me, I knew exactly what they were dealing with,” Foxx said.