Democrat Frank Lautenberg is New Jersey’s senior senator. He was first elected to the Senate in 1982, retired in 2000, and then returned to run again in October 2002 after Democratic Sen. Robert Torricelli withdrew from his re-election race. He announced on Feb. 14, 2013 that he would retire rather than face a tough primary challenge from Newark Mayor Cory Booker.
"I am not announcing the end of anything. I am announcing the beginning of a two-year mission to pass new gun safety laws, protect children from toxic chemicals and create more opportunities for working families in New Jersey,” the 89-year-old Lautenberg told The Star-Ledger of Newark in a statement. “While I may not be seeking re-election, there is plenty of work to do before the end of this term and I'm going to keep fighting as hard as ever for the people of New Jersey in the U.S. Senate.”
Lautenberg grew up in Paterson, the son of Russian and Polish immigrants. His father, a silk worker who also once ran a tavern, died of cancer while Lautenberg was still in high school, and he worked nights and weekends to help with the family finances. He served in the Army Signal Corps in World War II and says he could not have gone to college without the GI Bill. He graduated from Columbia University and in 1952 he joined a young firm called Automatic Data Processing, which organized information using punch-card machines—the forerunner to computers. In time, ADP was processing the payroll for nearly 10% of the private-sector jobs in the United States. When the company went public in 1961, Lautenberg’s stock was valued at $50,000; now, his net worth exceeds $49 million, according to his financial disclosure forms, and ADP is still in business as one of the world’s largest providers of outsourced business services. (Lautenberg’s charitable foundation, however, lost the $7 million in Bernard Madoff’s massive fraud scheme in 2001 and 2002.) Lautenberg was a contributor to Democratic campaigns and landed on President Richard Nixon’s “enemies list” after he gave $90,000 to George McGovern’s campaign in 1972.
In 1982, Democratic Sen. Harrison Williams resigned after his conviction in the Abscam bribery scandal, and his appointed successor, Republican Nicholas Brady, did not seek a full term. Lautenberg ran for the seat, spending $5 million of his own money and touting his experience in technology. He defeated several more seasoned politicians in the primary. In the general election, he faced U.S. Rep. Millicent Fenwick, an eccentric 72-year-old who was satirized in the Doonesbury comic strip. Lautenberg, then still in his 50s, made an issue of Fenwick’s age by referring to her as a “national monument” and questioning her “fitness” to do the job. He won 51%-48%. (Although his term began in January 1983, Lautenberg actually began serving in December 1982, after the governor appointed him to finish the remaining few weeks of Brady’s term.)
Lautenberg says he believes that government helped him and others work their way up, and in his first three terms in the Senate he established a solidly liberal voting record. He bucked his party only occasionally. One of his successes then was his battle against smoking in public places. A former smoker himself, Lautenberg got Congress to ban smoking in federal buildings and on airplanes on all domestic flights. In recent years, he has called for stricter labeling of the ingredients in cigarettes and for a ban on electronic cigarettes. He has also been a strong backer of stricter gun laws, and is the author of the 1996 law barring people convicted of domestic abuse from possessing firearms; it was upheld 7-2 by the Supreme Court in 2009. In 1997, Lautenberg was one of the few Democrats to enthusiastically support the balanced-budget deal that President Bill Clinton forged with Republican congressional leaders. His support was key to Clinton’s success in getting the measure through the Senate. Lautenberg won re-election relatively easily over retired Gen. Pete Dawkins in 1988 and Assembly Speaker Chuck Haytaian in 1994. In 1998, he seemed primed to run again, and no well-known Republican appeared eager to challenge him. But in February 1999, he announced that he would retire in 2000.
Before long, however, national Democrats were facing a big problem with New Jersey’s other Senate seat. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan was investigating charges that businessman David Chang had given lavish gifts and cash to Torricelli and that Torricelli had worked to advance Chang’s business interests in South Korea. Torricelli did give such assistance, but he denied receiving gifts. No charges were brought, but the Senate Ethics Committee “severely admonished” Torricelli for violating a rule against receiving gifts over $50. His Republican opponent, businessman Doug Forrester, made much of Torricelli’s problems and Torricelli plummeted in the polls. The following Sunday, Gov. Jim McGreevey, Sen. Jon Corzine (elected in 2000 to succeed Lautenberg) and other New Jersey Democratic leaders met in Trenton, and in a conference call with Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, they discussed the need for Torricelli to withdraw from the race. On Monday he did.
New Jersey Democrats were now in need of a well-known candidate to replace Torricelli. Rep. Robert Menendez was seeking a leadership position in the House and was not interested. Rep. Robert Andrews was vetoed by McGreevey, who had narrowly defeated him in the 1997 gubernatorial primary. Lautenberg, well-known and capable of self-financing, let it be known he was available and Democrats quickly agreed on him.
New Jersey law does not contain a provision for substituting a new candidate so late in the campaign unless a candidate has died. Ballots with Torricelli’s name had already been printed. But the New Jersey Supreme Court is made up of judicial activists from both parties with a propensity to accommodate party insiders. In October 2002, it quickly approved state Democrats’ request to substitute Lautenberg for Torricelli and ordered the state Democratic Party to pay the $800,000 needed to print new ballots. The Lautenberg campaign moved into Torricelli’s headquarters and Lautenberg was again a candidate for the Senate, and without having to spend months campaigning. The easiest source of funds proved unavailable: Torricelli, who never liked Lautenberg, said he would not send over a dime from his $5 million campaign treasury.
Republican nominee Forrester suddenly had a more formidable opponent than the weakened Torricelli. He did run a cute ad on cable television showing a kid slamming his hand on his desk and saying, “I can’t do this. I quit! If I fail this test, can I have Frank Lautenberg take it for me?” Forrester attacked Lautenberg as soft on defense and terrorism, citing his 1991 vote against the Gulf War resolution, and he questioned whether Lautenberg at 78—six years older than Millicent Fenwick was when Lautenberg questioned her ability to do the job—was too old. Lautenberg hit Forrester on the issues and made a special point of noting his positions against state-paid abortions and gun control. Forrester spent $10 million altogether, including $7.5 million of his own money, but got little help from national Republicans, who did not target the race. Lautenberg spent $1.5 million of his own money and was helped by $1.2 million from national and New Jersey Democrats. He won 54%-44%, a better showing than he’d had in 1994, when the state was significantly less Democratic.
Once back in the Senate, Lautenberg was disappointed when the Democratic Caucus did not give him full credit for his seniority. But he quickly directed his ire toward the Bush administration. He moved aggressively to stop privatization of the air traffic control system, holding up the Federal Aviation Administration’s reauthorization in 2003 until the FAA swore off privatization. He voted against the Republicans’ Medicare prescription drug bill that year, even though it was supported by many New Jersey pharmaceutical companies. During 2004, Lautenberg kept up a drumbeat of criticism of the Pentagon for awarding sole-source contracts to Halliburton, which Vice President Dick Cheney’s formerly headed. He also opposed the administration on the Iraq war, and he sponsored an amendment to allow the media to photograph the coffins of fallen service personnel being returned to their families through Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. He seemed distinctly more outspoken in his second stint, and his New Jersey colleague in the Senate at the time, Corzine, observed, “He’s less risk-averse. I think Frank couldn’t care less.” Lautenberg said, “I do feel unconstrained.”
From his seat on the Commerce Committee, Lautenberg has looked after his state’s transportation needs with an emphasis on guarding against terrorist threats. He has pressed for better security at airports, seaports, and railroads. Lautenberg won a seat on the Appropriations Committee in 2007, and inserted provisions in that year’s appropriations bills barring federal pre-emption of tougher state chemical safety laws, such as New Jersey’s. He sponsored a bill on vessel safety, requiring double hulls on fuel tankers. He and Menendez, now a senator, sponsored a bill, based on the 9/11 commission’s recommendations, to require radiation scanning of all shipping cargo containers by 2012. Also in 2007, Lautenberg secured $14.7 million to begin engineering work on the proposed ARC (Access to the Region’s Core) twin new rail tunnels from northern New Jersey to Manhattan.
In 2008, in contrast to eight years before, Lautenberg showed no hesitancy in seeking another term. “There is a lot that remains to be done,” he told the Bergen Record. “The people respect what I do. They know I’m straightforward in my efforts for my state. And I want to continue doing it.” He started fundraising early. And when all three Republican candidates for the seat in February 2008 opposed Gov. Corzine’s plan to lease the New Jersey Turnpike and raise tolls, Lautenberg came out against it too, despite his close relationship with Corzine. In April, Democratic Rep. Robert Andrews announced he was running in the June Democratic primary. There was an obvious contrast in their ages—Lautenberg was 84, Andrews was 50—and in their political bases. Andrews is from Camden County in South Jersey, and in his previous statewide primary, for governor in 1997, he had won big margins in the Philadelphia media market. Lautenberg had already won the backing of all 21 county party organizations, usually decisive in New Jersey’s light-voting primaries, but Andrews accumulated some endorsements, including prominent state legislators from Union and Middlesex counties, as well as from Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts from Camden County.
Lautenberg campaigned aggressively. “Age has nothing to do with it,” he argued. “It’s about effectiveness, and I’ve been effective in office.” He ran an ad attacking Andrews for his support for the Iraq war resolution in October 2002, with pictures of President George W. Bush and Cheney. (At the time, Lautenberg issued statements generally supporting military action but, being out of office, did not vote on the resolution.) Andrews countered that he would be a more vigorous senator. His supporters noted that Lautenberg’s wife was registered to vote on Park Avenue in New York City. Lautenberg spent $5.7 million, lending his campaign $1.65 million, while Andrews spent $3 million. The voting ran along regional lines. Andrews won 71% of the votes in South Jersey and Lautenberg won 75% in North Jersey. Unfortunately for Andrews, three-quarters of the votes were cast in North Jersey, and Lautenberg won 59%-35%. But Andrews managed a soft landing by figuring out a way to save his place in the House. He had his wife put her name on the ballot in the election for his House seat, so when he lost the Senate race, all he had to do was substitute as the Democratic nominee, which he did.
In the general election, Lautenberg faced former Rep. Dick Zimmer, who had lost to Torricelli 53%-43% in 1996. Zimmer criticized Lautenberg for sponsoring spending earmarks and for supporting the $700 billion rescue of the financial industry in 2008. Lautenberg said that the measure “isn’t perfect, but it is real action when we need it,” and he defended the earmarks as worthwhile for New Jersey and the country. Zimmer spent only $945,000 and national Republicans, on the defensive in many other states, did not target the race. Lautenberg won 56%-42% and became the first New Jersey senator in history to be elected to a fifth term.
In the 111th Congress (2009-10), Lautenberg was at the forefront to impose some restrictions on guns. He sponsored a bill to require background checks for purchases at gun shows and voted against allowing guns into national parks and wildlife refuges. In 2010, he called for restrictions on gun purchases by persons on the government’s terrorist watch list, and objected when Democratic leaders agreed to a provision exempting the National Rifle Association from the DISCLOSE Act, requiring more transparency in campaign financing. In January 2011, he sought to ban high-capacity magazines like those used in the shooting of Arizona Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others at a Tucson supermarket.
On fiscal issues, Lautenberg in December 2010 was one of 19 senators who voted against the deal hammered out by President Barack Obama and Republican congressional leaders extending the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts, including those for high-income earners, for two years. He told The Star-Ledger newspaper, “Because of a good business career, I made some money and the last thing I need is a tax cut. I’d rather have a strong country than a tax cut.” He also continued to earmark funds for New Jersey projects, including $206 million for the ARC tunnels in July 2010.
On the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, Launtenberg had hoped to become chairman after the 2010 election, claiming that former Senate Majority Leader Daschle had promised him the chairmanship when inducing him to run again in 2002. But current Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and party leaders gave the gavel to Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, who had more seniority. In memory of the 38 people from New Jersey who died in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 engineered by Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, Lautenberg spoke at a rally in Englewood to prevent Gaddafi from staying at Libyan property there. Prompted by the suicide of a New Jersey soldier, he and Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., sought to bolster mental health services for National Guard and Reserve personnel. Lautenberg was moved to tears while attending a memorial service in 2010 for Rutgers student Tyler Clementi, who killed himself after fellow students posted a video of him in an intimate, and thought to be private, encounter with another man.
Lautenberg’s relations with New Jersey colleagues are sometimes frosty, though the level of hostilities has not risen to the level he had with Torricelli. He and Andrews did not speak for some time after the 2008 election. He reacted angrily, and threatened to hold hearings, when Republican Gov. Chris Christie canceled the ARC tunnels project in October 2010, citing cost overruns. “Killing the ARC tunnel will go down as one of the biggest public policy blunders in New Jersey’s history,” Lautenberg said. “Without increased transportation options into Manhattan, New Jersey’s economy will eventually be crippled.”
Asked during the 2008 campaign whether he would serve the full six-year term, Lautenberg, then 84, said, “Yeah. Why not?” On his 86th birthday, his wife took him to a Lady Gaga concert. In February 2010, Lautenberg was diagnosed with B-cell lymphoma of the stomach, a cancer readily treatable by chemotherapy.
