FAYETTEVILLE (KFSM) – Attorney General-Elect Leslie Rutledge on Tuesday (Nov. 25) named Julie Benafield as chief deputy attorney general.
Benafield, of Hazen, is former state insurance commission under Gov. Mike Huckabee. She also has served as chief executive officer of the Arkansas Workers’ Compensation Commission, general counsel at the Arkansas Development Finance Authority, the attorney supervisor of the Workers’ Compensation Fraud Investigation Unit of the Arkansas Insurance Department and deputy prosecuting attorney in Arkansas’ Sixth District, which includes Pulaski and Perry counties.
A graduate of Ouachita Baptist University and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock law school, Benafield most recently has been president of the Benafield Group, which, according to the firm’s website, was formed earlier this year to provide governmental affairs services on regulatory issues.
In a prepared statement, Rutledge said Benafield “understands management of attorneys in a state agency and has been an integral part of my transition team.”
Rutledge, a Republican, won nearly 52 percent of the vote on Nov. 4 in defeating state Rep. Nate Steel, D-Nashville, for the open attorney general’s seat.
