Bob Graham, former U.S. senator and Florida governor, dies at 87 – NPR

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Former U.S. Senator and two-term Florida Governor Bob Graham, who gained national prominence as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee following the 2001 terrorist attacks and as the one of the first critics of the war in Iraq, has died. . He was 87 years old.

Graham’s family announced the death Tuesday in a statement posted on X by his daughter Gwen Graham.

“We are deeply saddened to announce the passing of a visionary leader, a dedicated public servant and, most importantly, a husband, father, grandfather and great-grand -loving father,” the family said.

Graham, who served three terms in the Senate, made an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, emphasizing his opposition to the invasion of Iraq.

But his candidacy was delayed by heart surgery in January 2003, and he never managed to gain enough traction with voters to catch up, and he withdrew that October. He did not seek re-election in 2004 and was replaced by Republican Mel Martinez.

Graham was a man of many idiosyncrasies. He perfected the “work day” political ploy of spending a day doing various jobs, from horse grinder to FBI agent, and kept a meticulous diary, noting almost everyone he spoke with, everything what he ate, the TV shows he watched and even his golf scores.

Graham said that the notebooks were a work tool for him and that he was reluctant to describe his emotions or personal feelings in them.

“I review them for calls to make, memos to dictate, meetings I want to follow up on and things people promise to do,” he said.

Graham was an early opponent of the Iraq War, saying it diverted America’s attention from the fight against terrorism, centered in Afghanistan. He also criticized President George W. Bush for his failure to implement an occupation plan in Iraq after the U.S. military ousted Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Graham said Bush dragged the United States into the war by exaggerating claims about the danger posed by Iraqi weapons of destruction that were never found. He said Bush misrepresented intelligence data and argued that was more serious than the sexual misconduct issues that led the House to impeach President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s. led to launch his short and aborted presidential campaign.

“The quagmire in Iraq is a diversion that the Bush administration, and it alone, created,” Graham said in 2003.

During his 18 years in Washington, Graham worked well with colleagues in both parties, particularly Florida Republican Connie Mack during their twelve years together in the Senate.

As a politician, few were better. Florida voters hardly saw him as the wealthy, Harvard-educated lawyer he was.

Graham’s political career spanned five decades, beginning with his election to the Florida House of Representatives in 1966.

He won a seat in the State Senate in 1970, then was elected governor in 1978. He was re-elected in 1982. Four years later, he won the first of three terms in the U.S. Senate by ousting Republican incumbent Paula Hawkins.

Graham remained very popular with Florida voters – winning re-election by wide margins in 1992 and 1998, when he carried 63 of 67 counties. In the latter election, he defeated Charlie Crist, who later served as Republican governor from 2007 to 2011.

“He blew me out of the water and I understood why even more during the campaign,” Crist said Tuesday night. “I learned to respect him even more than before and to love him for the good and honest man that he was.”

Crist, who has since switched parties and recently served as a U.S. representative, said Graham had an influence on him.

“I always thought that when he was governor, he tried to govern for the people of Florida – in no way political or partisan – and I took that to heart and tried, in one way or another. “another, to imitate him,” Crist said. said.

Even in Washington, Graham never took his eyes off the state and Tallahassee leaders.

When Gov. Jeb Bush and the Republican-controlled Legislature eliminated the Board of Regents in 2001, Graham saw it as an attempt to politicize the state university system. He successfully led a petition the following year for a state constitutional amendment that created the Board of Governors to assume the role of regents.

Daniel Robert Graham was born November 9, 1936, in Coral Gables, where his father, Ernest “Cap” Graham, had moved from South Dakota and established a large dairy farm. Young Bob milked cows, built fences and scooped manure as a teenager. One of his half-brothers, Phillip Graham, was publisher of the Washington Post and Newsweek until he committed suicide in 1963, just a year after Bob Graham received his law degree from Harvard.

Graham was student body president at Miami Senior High School and attended the University of Florida, graduating in 1959.

In 1966, he was elected to the Florida Legislature, where he focused largely on education and health care issues.

Graham had a rocky start as Florida’s general manager and was nicknamed “Gov. Jello” due to his early indecisiveness. He shook that label by managing several serious crises.

As governor, he also signed numerous death warrants, founded the Save the Manatee Club with artist Jimmy Buffett, and led efforts to establish several environmental programs.

Graham passed a bond program to purchase beaches and barrier islands threatened by development and launched the Save Our Everglades program to protect the state’s water supply, wetlands and endangered species.

Graham was also known for her 408 “days of work,” including positions as a housewife, boxing ring announcer, flight attendant, and arson investigator. They grew out of a stint teaching as a member of the Florida Senate Education Committee, then morphed into a campaign gimmick that helped him relate to the average voter.

“It’s been a very important part of my development as a public official, I’ve learned on a very human level what the people of Florida expect, what they want, what their aspirations are, and then I tried to interpret that and make it into policy that would improve their lives,” Graham said in 2004 as he finished his last job wrapping Christmas presents.

After leaving public life in 2005, Graham spent much of his time at a public policy center named after him at the University of Florida and pushed the Legislature to require more civics courses in schools. public schools in the state.

Graham was one of five members selected for an independent commission by President Barack Obama in June 2010 to investigate a massive BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that threatened marine life and beaches in several southeastern states of the Gulf.