Herbert Garrison

Herbert Garrison
South Park character
Garrison as he appears as the President of the United States, as of season 20
First appearance	"Cartman Gets an Anal Probe"
Created by	Matt Stone Trey Parker
Voiced by	Trey Parker
Information
Full name	Herbert Garrison
Aliases	Janet Garrison Ethan P. Garrison (pen name)
Gender	Male (seasons 1–8 & seasons 12–present) Female (seasons 9–12)
Occupation	Former Elementary school teacher Former writer President of the United States
Title	President
Residence	White House

Herbert Garrison is a fictional character in the American animated television series South Park, and the 45th President of the United States in the show. He is voiced by Trey Parker. For the first eight seasons of the series, the character was known as Mr. Garrison. He underwent a sex change in the season 9 premiere "Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina". The character was thereafter known to the other characters as Janet Garrison or Mrs. Garrison, despite being unmarried. In the season 12 episode "Eek, a Penis!", he undergoes yet another sex change operation, returning to being a man. Garrison is particularly cynical, especially in comparison with the rest of South Park's adults, and he is one of the few characters to ever break the fourth wall on the show.

Mr. Garrison was in part inspired by a kindergarten teacher whom Trey Parker had in the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools. This teacher used a puppet named Mr. Hat as a teaching resource. Mr. Garrison was also inspired by a British literature professor Parker had at the University of Colorado; Parker said the voice he uses for the character is a dead-accurate impression of him. Parker said he believes Mr. Garrison has become one of the most complex characters on South Park, particularly due to his ever-growing relationship with Mr. Hat and his sexuality and gender issues; Parker said of Mr. Garrison, "He's the soap opera element to the whole series. [He] has a real story going on."

Born September 26, Garrison grew up in Arkansas, speaks with a Southern accent, and claims to have a master's degree in mechanical engineering from Denver Community College (as seen in the episode "The Entity"). Mr. Garrison is sexually confused. During the entirety of the show he has had heterosexual and same-sex relationships, both while living as a man and living as a woman. Across the series he displays myriad conflicting and ambiguous sexual identities, which he clings to exclusively for long periods of time. This may have some relation to the multiple personality disorder, which Mr. Garrison manifested in earlier seasons through Mr. Hat and Mr. Twig.