Dennis Bonner

Who is Dennis Bonner?

Dennis Bonner was elected as a Democrat state legislator representing the 51st District in the Missouri House of Representatives from January 1995 through January 2003, serving a total of four two-year terms before withdrawing from political life after obtaining a law degree and then practicing law, first in partnership with another former Missouri legislator, Ralph Monaco, and then in his own private practice in Lee's Summit, Missouri.

With his district and constituents mainly in Independence, Missouri and parts of Kansas City, Missouri and adjoining communities, Mr. Bonner's tenure as legislator was marked by his "bucking the tide" and voting or speaking his conscience and the voice of his constituency even when in opposition to the party's leadership in the state's Capitol, Jefferson City, Missouri. Immediately branded a "renegade," Dennis Bonner was expelled from the Democratic Caucus in February 1995 just one month after being sworn in, for refusing to vote for an unprecedented eighth term for Speaker of the House Bob F. Griffin. "He's got to go," Bonner said [at the time]. "Under Bob Griffin's style of government, the caucus is his circus.