Representative Trey Hollingsworth

Joseph Albert “Trey” Hollingsworth III (born September 12, 1983) is an American businessman and politician who represented Indiana’s 9th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from January 3, 2017, to January 3, 2023. A member of the Republican Party, he served three terms in Congress during a period of significant national political and economic change, participating in the legislative process and representing the interests of his southern Indiana constituents. Throughout his tenure, he was particularly active on financial services, government reform, and business-related policy.

Hollingsworth was born in Clinton, Tennessee, and raised in East Tennessee. He attended the Webb School in Knoxville, Tennessee, a private preparatory school, before enrolling at the University of Pennsylvania. At Penn, he studied at the Wharton School, from which he graduated as one of its youngest graduates. His early academic and professional trajectory reflected a strong focus on finance, entrepreneurship, and industrial redevelopment, foundations that would later inform his approach to both business and public policy.

Following his graduation from the Wharton School, Hollingsworth entered the private sector and built a career as an entrepreneur and investor. He founded Hollingsworth Capital Partners with his father, Joe Hollingsworth Jr., focusing on the acquisition and rehabilitation of older industrial and manufacturing properties. The firm specialized in rebuilding and returning to service dormant manufacturing sites and distribution facilities. By 2007, Hollingsworth Capital Partners owned 27 distribution centers in 22 states and generated more than $32 million in revenue. In 2008, the company was ranked No. 12 on the Inc. 500 list of the fastest-growing companies in the United States. In addition to his real estate and industrial redevelopment activities, Hollingsworth founded an aluminum remanufacturing company that was reported to have produced approximately 1.8 billion pounds of aluminum before it was sold. He later established his residence in Jeffersonville, Indiana, positioning himself in the heart of the district he would go on to represent.

Hollingsworth entered electoral politics in 2015. In October of that year, he declared his candidacy for the U.S. House of Representatives in Indiana’s 9th congressional district, an open seat at the time. Running in the Republican primary, he faced several well-known Indiana figures, including Attorney General Greg Zoeller and State Senators Erin Houchin and Brent Waltz. Hollingsworth won the Republican primary with 34 percent of the vote. In the November 2016 general election, he defeated Democratic nominee Shelli Yoder with 54 percent of the vote, securing his first term in Congress. He was sworn into office on January 3, 2017, and subsequently won reelection in 2018 and 2020. In 2018, he defeated Democratic nominee Liz Watson, who had been endorsed by Senator Elizabeth Warren, by a margin of 59 percent to 41 percent. In 2020, he won a third term with more than 61 percent of the vote against Democratic challenger Andy Ruff and Libertarian candidate Tonya Millis. Upon his 2020 victory, Hollingsworth publicly stated that he was honored to serve a third term and emphasized his commitment to working with Hoosiers to support policies that put American families first and expand opportunities for Indiana residents.

During his three terms in the House of Representatives, Hollingsworth served continuously on the House Committee on Financial Services, where he developed a reputation for engagement on issues related to capital markets, financial regulation, and consumer finance. He was the vice ranking member of the Subcommittee on Investor Protection, Entrepreneurship, and Capital Markets and also served on the Subcommittee on Housing, Community Development, and Insurance, as well as the Subcommittee on Diversity and Inclusion. In these roles, he was active in efforts to regulate and modernize aspects of the financial services industry. Among other initiatives, he led an inquiry to the Federal Reserve seeking the removal of regulations that he believed hindered retail investors’ ability to use margin to invest in certain stocks. He introduced legislation to prevent government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from lobbying the federal government while they remained under government ownership, and he pressed the Federal Insurance Office to support state-level regulation of auto insurance. In 2019, he introduced the Senior Security Act, aimed at protecting senior citizen investors from financial fraud and abuse, and coauthored the bipartisan Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Lobbying Regulation Act to further restrict lobbying by those entities.

Hollingsworth’s legislative work extended into emerging areas of financial technology and digital assets. Following an investigation into the reserves of the stablecoin issuer Tether, he introduced the Stablecoin Transparency Act to improve consumer information and regulatory clarity regarding “stablecoins,” digital assets designed to maintain a stable value. In 2022, he and Representative Josh Gottheimer led a bipartisan letter to the U.S. Department of the Treasury requesting more information about Tether’s exposure to foreign assets. Earlier, in 2019, he and Representative Emanuel Cleaver had led a bipartisan letter to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) urging the agency to explore the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning to more efficiently detect and deter financial crimes, such as fraud, in cooperation with banks. He also campaigned against certain Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) rules that he argued would impose undue compliance costs on small businesses, compromise individual privacy, and reduce access to consumer lending.

Government reform and institutional accountability were central themes of Hollingsworth’s congressional career. He publicly pledged to serve no more than eight years (four terms) in the House of Representatives and made congressional term limits a signature issue. In each of the 115th, 116th, and 117th Congresses, the first bill he introduced was a proposed constitutional amendment to impose term limits on federal lawmakers, limiting service to four terms in the House and two terms in the Senate. He also repeatedly introduced the Banning Lobbying and Safeguarding Trust Act, which would permanently prohibit former members of Congress from registering as lobbyists, a measure he argued was necessary to ensure that elected officials vote for their constituents rather than future clients. Consistent with his reform agenda, he voted against all short-term spending bills, contending that such measures represented a failure of the budget process and a waste of taxpayer dollars.

In addition to his financial services and reform work, Hollingsworth engaged in a range of policy areas important to his Indiana district, including agriculture, workforce development, and transportation. He introduced the Livestock Protection Act to address concerns raised by local farmers about predatory black vultures attacking livestock, and in the 115th Congress he voted for the 2018 Farm Bill, which funded and updated programs at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Reflecting his pro-business orientation, he received a cumulative score of 84 percent in 2019 from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce based on votes the Chamber identified as “critical business legislation.” To address workforce challenges faced by Indiana employers, he supported the Carl Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, designed to help young people develop skills for high-wage jobs in sectors such as agriculture, manufacturing, public safety, business, and information technology. He also repeatedly introduced the Developing Responsible Individuals for a Vibrant Economy (DRIVE-Safe) Act in the 115th, 116th, and 117th Congresses, establishing a safety and training program to allow qualified commercial driver’s license holders aged 18 to 21 to drive across state lines, with the aim of easing driver shortages while maintaining safety standards.

Hollingsworth’s service in Congress coincided with a period of intense national debate over economic policy, regulatory oversight, and the role of government. He participated in the democratic process as a member of the House of Representatives, contributing to legislative deliberations and advocating for policies he believed would foster economic growth, protect investors, and reform government institutions. On January 12, 2022, he announced that he would not seek reelection in 2022, in keeping with his previously stated commitment to limited congressional service. He completed his third term on January 3, 2023. After leaving office, he remained known as both a businessman and former representative, residing in Jeffersonville, Indiana, and associated with the entrepreneurial and policy interests that had shaped his public career.