J.B. Horton is a 4th generation Texan who was born and raised in the small Panhandle town of Pampa. After graduating from Pampa High School, J.B. attended West Texas A&M University, where he played on the nationally ranked men’s tennis team and was elected as student body president for two terms his junior and senior years. During his second term, he was elected as the chairman of the Texas A&M System Chancellor’s Student Advisory Board, representing over 88,000 students. At WT, Mr. Horton championed a student endowment for scholarships, which has now grown to more than $5 million and produces over $250,000 scholarships each year for WT students. He was named WT’s Man of the Year in 1998 and in 1999 he became the first individual in WT’s history to receive the Silver Buffalo Award, the highest award given by the University president. He graduated in 1998 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in international business.
After graduating from college, he moved to Veracruz Mexico to study Spanish before moving to Austin to work on President Bush’s 2000 presidential campaign. He then moved to Washington D.C. where he worked at the Republican National Committee. After President Bush won the election in 2000, Mr. Horton was asked to serve on the transition team to the White House. During the two terms of the Bush Administration, Mr. Horton worked in several different roles: Staff Assistant in Presidential Personnel at The White House, Special Assistant in the Small Business Administration’s Office of International Trade; Associate Director in the State Department’s White House Liaison Office; and in the final years, as White House Liaison to the General Services Administration.
While in Washington, he received a sponsored Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship to study in England. He received his Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Leeds University Business School in 2005. After completing this degree, he returned to serve in the Bush Administration for the remainder of President Bush’s term in office.
After completing his work in the Bush Administration, J.B. and his wife, Lindsay, spent two months in the central Asian country of Tajikistan, where they served as humanitarian consultants on an energy project. This was a missionary effort through their church.
For 8 ½ years, J.B. worked at The Heritage Foundation, managing a development team that covered all states west of the Mississippi River. In his tenure at Heritage, he was personally responsible for raising over $100 million to aid the Heritage Foundation in promoting conservative causes across the country. In 2017, he co-authored a fundraising book dedicated to his late mentor, John Von Kannon, called The 10 Laws of Fundraising.
J.B. joined the Texas Public Policy Foundation team in 2018 and he currently serves as the Executive Vice President, charged with leading the Development and Events teams. He and his wife, Lindsay, have three children: Audrey, Ben, and Sam. They proudly live in Fort Worth, Texas.