Karl Dean

In 2017, Dean declared his candidacy for Governor of Tennessee in the 2018 election. In the first three months of the campaign, Dean raised $1.2 million and spent $200,000; he went on to win the Democratic nomination on August 2, 2018 and advanced to the general election. Dean lost the election to businessman Bill Lee.

On February 26, 2017, Dean announced he would run for Governor of Tennessee in the 2018 election as a Democrat. He cast himself as a pro-business moderate running on a message of education, jobs, and healthcare in Tennessee.

Dean left office on September 25, 2015. He was succeeded by Megan Barry, the first woman to be Mayor of Nashville.

With public safety as one of Dean's primary campaign promises, Dean increased the size of the Nashville police force by 13.5 percent. In conjunction with this, Dean opened two new precincts to more equally distribute areas of coverage and started Nashville's first DNA crime lab. By 2013, Nashville had reached the lowest crime numbers and homicide rate in its history.

Dean easily won re-election in August 2011 with 79.2% of the vote.

Dean announced his mayoral candidacy on December 19, 2006. His campaign message focused on improving education, public safety, and economic development saying "it's all connected." In the general election on August 2, 2007, he placed first with 24.6% of the vote. This advanced him to a run-off election against Bob Clement. On September 11, 2007 Dean won the run-off election with 52.2% of the vote.

In March 2005, Karl Dean wrote that Mayor Bill Purcell could seek a third term, despite a 1994 referendum on "any elected office authorized or created by the [Metro] charter." This was because the 1963 charter states that there is a three-term limit for mayors, the 1994 amendment took place against a backdrop of a push for congressional term limits, and local public discussion focused on the Metro Council. In January 2003, he said a proposed law to ban job discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation was not unconstitutional.

When Metro Council members' health-care benefits came under scrutiny in September 2004, because the Metro Charter does not allow pension benefits for Council members, Dean said that a health-care benefit wouldn't legally fall under a pension benefit, and therefore wouldn't be against the Charter.

Dean has been married to Anne Davis, a prominent Tennessee lawyer, since August 6, 1983. Anne Davis is a relative of Joe C. Davis Jr. and Rascoe Davis and is a proprietor of the Joe C. Davis Foundation in Nashville. Both Anne and Karl are Catholic. Dean and his wife have three children, Rascoe, Frances, and Wallen.

He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia University in 1978 and a Juris Doctor from Vanderbilt University in 1981. His campaign message for Mayor of Nashville focused on improving education, public safety and economic development saying "it's all connected." During Dean's first year in office, he reworked the arrangement between Metro and the Nashville Predators in order to keep the team in Nashville. During Dean's first term, he faced two major challenges: the Great Recession and the 2010 Tennessee floods. During his two terms in office, Dean transformed Downtown Nashville by adding a new minor league baseball stadium, a riverfront amphitheater and park and a new convention center dubbed Music City Center. Dean was friendly towards business and often used tax incentives to lure companies to Nashville. He is also involved in conservationist efforts of historical areas such as Music Row through his involvement with Music Industry Coalition. He helped preserve historic sites such as RCA Studio A.

Karl Foster Dean (born September 20, 1955) is an American politician who served as the 68th Mayor of Nashville, Tennessee from 2007 to 2015. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as Nashville's Director of Law under Mayor Bill Purcell from 1999 to 2007. In 1990, 1994 and 1998, he was elected the city's public defender. Dean, an attorney by occupation, is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law at Vanderbilt University Law School.