Hayden Haynes, a Minden native who has been U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson’s chief of staff since Johnson was elected to Congress, is leaving his role to join the global law firm K&L Gates in Washington as a government affairs counselor.
Haynes, a Louisiana Tech University graduate who ran Johnson’s first congressional campaign in 2016 as a 27-year-old, told USA Today Network his new position would allow more time at home with his wife, Jennifer, and their son, Brody.
“Serving the people of Louisiana’s Fourth Congressional District and later the speaker’s office under Mike Johnson has truly been an honor of a lifetime,” Haynes said. “Words can’t express the gratitude I have for the people of Louisiana, but especially for Speaker Johnson and his family. Mike, Kelly, Hannah, Abby, Jack and Will have become family to me, and I will forever be grateful for his friendship and wise counsel.
“Our country and our state are better off having a speaker of the House with the character, integrity and love of country that Mike Johnson does, and I am grateful to have had the honor of serving Louisiana and the country nation alongside him.”
And Haynes has been alongside Johnson from the beginning, which the speaker emphasized in a tribute to Haynes on the House floor June 4.
“Even before the speakership, before the Cannon office that was split in the middle by a women’s restroom, before the apartment campaign office above the radio station (in Shreveport), it was Hayden who built this ship from the ground up,” Johnson said. “I will always be grateful for that, and we’re going to miss him.”
Johnson called Haynes the “most integral member” of his staff and “somebody who’s been by my side for more than a decade.”
Haynes first met Johnson when the future speaker was a member of the Louisiana House and asked the state representative to lunch.
During that meeting Johnson recalled Haynes presenting a yellow legal pad with the words “Path to Congress” written at the top.
“He spent the next hour mapping out what he saw to be a road to D.C. that ran through our little town of Shreveport,” Johnson said.
A few months later, Johnson entered the race for Congress with Haynes as his campaign manager and won the 4th Congressional District seat.
Haynes, who joins K&L Gates on June 15, will be replaced as Johnson’s top aide by current Deputy Chief of Staff Garrett Fultz.