DURENBERGER, FORMER US SENATOR FROM MINNESOTA, DIES AT 88
Durenberger, former US senator from Minnesota, dies at 88
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Former U.S. Senator David Durenberger, a Minnesota Republican who espoused a progressive brand of politics and criticized the GOP after his political career, died Tuesday at age 88.
Durenberger’s health had declined in recent months, his longtime spokesperson Tom Horner said. Horner told The Associated Press that Durenberger died Tuesday morning of natural causes. He was at his St. Paul home surrounded by family.
Durenberger — a former executive secretary to GOP Gov. Harold LeVander, former corporate attorney and former captain in the U.S. Army Reserve — won a U.S. Senate seat in 1978. He served three terms and championed health care reform. He pushed proposals to expand Medicare benefits, protect rights for disabled people, including the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act, and to promote gender equity.
“Senator Dave Durenberger was a true public servant,” Democratic U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, of Minnesota, said in a statement. Klobuchar, who holds Durenberger’s old seat, said he had personally showed her much kindness when she was first elected in 2006.
“He was a dedicated legislator who was always guided by his devotion to bipartisanship and improving people’s lives,” Klobuchar said. “His work to advance the Americans with Disabilities Act and prohibit discrimination against people with disabilities changed millions of lives for the better and made our nation stronger.”
Durenberger’s first wife, Judy, died of breast cancer in 1970, leaving him a widower raising four sons. Dave Durenberger, his son, said he stayed an active father, attending their athletic matches.
When he ran for office in the late 1970′s, his sons helped stuff envelopes at their dining room table, joined parades and helped on the campaign.
“He was sort of our north star for how we needed to live our lives,” Dave Durenberger said.
As he rose through the Senate, Durenberger went through troubled periods in his personal life. He separated from his wife, Penny, in 1985 -- a personal agony he openly discussed with several reporters at the time. He married Susan Foote, a former member of his staff, in 1995.
Dave Durenberger said his father in recent years was a frequent presence at his grandchildren’s school and sports events. Durenberger showed his family how to value people, regardless of their social status, he said.
“He tried to find the goodness or the common bond that he shared with everybody. Everybody had the potential to be his friend -- whether it was the King of Jordan or the Jordanian immigrant driving a cab,” Dave Durenberger said.
But Senator Durenberger's career took a downturn in 1990. He was unanimously censured by the Senate following an Ethics Committee investigation into payments he received for book royalties and federal reimbursements for stays in a Minneapolis condo. In 1995, Durenberger also pleaded guilty to five misdemeanor charges related to the condo payments.
“If there is a smudge on the Seal of the United States Senate, or on the Star of the North, as we like to call our state, I will work my hardest to polish both back to brightness,” Durenberger told his Senate colleagues after his censure.
He decided not to run for reelection in 1994. Following his exit from politics, he worked with a number of initiatives focused on health care policy. As chair of the National Institute of Health Policy at the University of St. Thomas Opus College of Business, he addressed systemic health care problems.
As the Republican Party tilted toward fiscal conservatives focused on slashing government programs, Durenberger became a critic. He told a Minnesota political podcast in 2005 that Democrats are “better equipped to carry the day” on health care policy, though he said at the time he would not become a Democrat.
In the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, he endorsed Democrats Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden over Donald Trump. And in 2018, he wrote a book with political reporter Lori Sturdevant titled, “When Republicans Were Progressive.” It mourned a nearly-extinct wing of the GOP in which lawmakers prided themselves on bipartisanship and sought to assist vulnerable people.
Horner said services will be held next week at Durenberger's alma mater, St. John's University in Collegeville.
Articles - Latest
- 3.2 MILLION-YEAR-OLD HUMAN ANCESTOR 'LUCY' HAD MASSIVE LEG MUSCLES TO STAND UP STRAIGHT AND CLIMB TREES
- PIONEERING BBC JOURNALIST STEPHEN GRIMASON DIES AGED 67
- AFTER DEATH: WHAT ARE THE BURIAL ALTERNATIVES TO REST IN PEACE?
- THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL REVIEW – THE SEXUAL STRATEGISING OF THE CONNIVING BOLEYN FAMILY BROUGHT SHARPLY TO LIFE
- MICHAEL BYRNE DIES AGED 36 AS TRIBUTES PAID TO FORMER GRAND NATIONAL JOCKEY
- Ukraine’s former Olympian weightlifter Oleksandr Pielieshenko killed in action
- FROM WHITE MISCHIEF TO BILL & TED, JOSS ACKLAND WAS AN ACTOR OF RARE POISE, RANGE AND PATHOS
- FOUNTAINS OF DIAMONDS THAT ERUPT FROM EARTH'S CENTER ARE REVEALING THE LOST HISTORY OF SUPERCONTINENTS
- ANCIENT HUMANS USED CAVE IN SPAIN AS BURIAL SPOT FOR 4 MILLENNIA, 7,000 BONES REVEAL
- THE MOODY BLUES FOUNDER MIKE PINDER HAS DIED AGED 82
- GOLD POCKET WATCH FOUND IN TITANIC SOLD FOR RECORD-BREAKING PRICE
- 5 CATASTROPHIC MEGATHRUST EARTHQUAKES LED TO THE DEMISE OF THE PRE-AZTEC CITY OF TEOTIHUACAN, NEW STUDY SUGGESTS
- FRENCH PALME D’OR WINNER LAURENT CANTET DIES AGED 63
- Norman Lear obituary
- AN UNHOLY TRAFFIC: HOW THE SLAVE TRADE CONTINUED THROUGH THE US CIVIL WAR
- QUEEN CHARLOTTE WAS ‘PERSON OF COLOUR’, MUSEUM CLAIMS IN LGBT GUIDE
- JEANETTE WINTERSON: I DIDN’T BELIEVE IN GHOSTS… UNTIL I STARTED LIVING WITH THEM
- ANCIENT HUMAN ACTIVITY DISCOVERED IN KILOMETER-LONG LAVA CAVE
- DNA ANALYSIS SPANNING 9 GENERATIONS OF PEOPLE REVEALS MARRIAGE PRACTICES OF MYSTERIOUS WARRIOR CULTURE
- LOST CITIES HIDDEN FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS DISCOVERED UNDER FOREST
- LETTER: ALAN ARKIN OBITUARY
- ARCHAEOLOGISTS CRACK MYSTERY OF ANCIENT MAYA AFTER 7,000-YEAR-OLD REMAINS FOUND
- NEW JERSEY REP. DONALD PAYNE JR. DEAD AT 65
Articles - Most Read
- Main
- Contact Us
- The science behind Ouija boards
- Cosmic Consciousness - What is Cosmic Consciousness-2
- Cosmic Consciousness-Introduction
- Cosmic Consciousness - Introduction-2
- MASSIVE 6.1 MAGNITUDE EARTHQUAKE HITS NEW ZEALAND AS NATION STILL REELING FROM CYCLONE
- ARCHAEOLOGISTS UNRAVEL THE TRUTH OF APHRODITE, GODDESS OF LOVE, ON VALENTINE'S DAY
- The Human Condition-Thomas Keating
- Cosmic Consciousness First Words - 1V - 2
- Cosmic Consciousness First Words - V -
- Cosmic Consciousness V - 2
- Cosmic consciousness - First Words - IV
- Cosmic Consciousness - What is Cosmic Consciousness?
- Evolution and Devolution-Chapter 2
- The Human Condition - Thomas keating-3
- The Human Condition-2-Thomas Keating
- Drinking From The Mountain Stream - Milarepa
- Cosmic Consciousness-On the Plane of Self Consciousness
- The Human Condition - 4
- Cosmic Consciousness - 3 - On the Plane of Self Consciousness
- Evolution and Devolution-Chapter 1
- The Human Condition - 6
- Shakyamuni Buddha or India the 1st “Black Revolutionary Hero.”
- On the Plane of Self Consciousness - 2
- Milarepa's World
- The Human Condition - 5
- Milarepa's World-2
- The Buddhist System of Liberation
- Contemplation and the Divine Therapy - 2
- On the Plane of Self Consciousness IV
- The Buddhist System of Liberation - 2
- JERRY RAWLINGS, GHANAIAN STRONG MAN WHO CAME TO POWER IN A COUP BUT INTRODUCED DEMOCRACY – OBITUARY
- On the Plane of Self Consciousness IV - 2