Theo Clarke

Theodora Roosevelt Clarke (born 4 August 1985) is a British Conservative Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Stafford from 2019 to 2024. Prior to her political career, she worked in the arts industry and founded the campaign group Coalition for Global Prosperity.

Early life and career Clarke grew up in the village of Bibury in Gloucestershire. Clarke also has a younger sister, Augusta. Clarke is a distant relative of US Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

She attended Downe House School, a private school in Newbury, Berkshire. She studied art history at Newcastle University Channel 4's Dispatches reported in 2023 that Clarke had visited Moscow in September 2012 on a Russian government-funded trip as part of a delegation from the Conservative Friends of Russia. She was also a co-founder of the Association of Women in the Arts, and later founded the Coalition for Global Prosperity in 2017. As part of her work at the campaign group she volunteered in Sierra Leone in the aftermath of the Ebola outbreak.

Parliamentary career Clarke contested the Bristol East seat at the 2015 and 2017 general elections as the Conservative Party candidate but was unsuccessful. The party selected her as the candidate for Stafford on 26 September 2019. The incumbent Conservative MP Jeremy Lefroy had previously announced that he would be standing down at the next election. She was elected as Stafford's MP in the 2019 general election with a majority of 14,377 (28.1%), the largest in the constituency's history.

On 5 October 2020, Clarke was appointed as the Prime Ministerial Trade Envoy to Kenya. She helped implement the UK-Kenya Economic Partnership Agreement which continued the duty-free access to the UK market for Kenyan businesses after Brexit. The agreement carried forward arrangements agreed by the European Union and the East African Community. Clarke resigned this role in July 2022 in protest at Prime Minister Boris Johnson's leadership.

Clarke endorsed Penny Mordaunt during the July 2022 Conservative Party leadership election.

Clarke took maternity leave following the birth of her first child in August 2022.

In February 2023, Clarke stated she was unable to be re-selected as Conservative candidate for Stafford, further stating she intended to appeal to local members in an attempt to stay on as candidate.

In March 2023, Clarke was re-adopted as the Conservative candidate for Stafford having won the wider membership vote.

In the 2024 general election, she lost her seat to Leigh Ingham from Labour.

Post-parliamentary career Following her defeat at the 2024 general election, Clarke was appointed as Vice-Chairman of the Board at the United Nations Association UK. Clarke is also a Fellow at the RSA.

Personal life Clarke married Henry Coram-James, son of John Coram-James and The Countess of Harrowby (formerly Caroline Coram-James) and stepson of the Earl of Harrowby, on 14 August 2021 at the Church of St Mary, Bibury. In March 2022, she announced that the couple were expecting their first child. Their daughter Arabella was born in August 2022.

Publications Breaking the Taboo: Why we need to talk about birth trauma (Biteback Publishing, 2025)