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Geraldine Ferraro

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Geraldine Anne Ferraro (born August 26 1935) is a Democratic politician and a former member of the United States House of Representatives. She is perhaps best known as the first—and, to date, only—female Vice Presidential candidate representing a major American political party.

Ferraro was a teacher, lawyer, and member of the Queens County District Attorney's Office prior to being elected to the United States Congress in 1978. In 1984, former Vice President and Presidential candidate Walter Mondale selected Ferraro to be his running mate in the upcoming election. The positive polling Mondale received when she joined him did not last until November, and they were defeated in an electoral landslide by incumbent President Ronald Reagan and Vice President George H. W. Bush. Following the 1984 election, she ran two campaigns for a seat in the United States Senate, but twice lost the nomination of her party in the primaries (by less than one percent in 1992, by considerably more in 1998). She served as a United States Ambassador to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights from 1993 until 1996 in the Presidential administration of Bill Clinton. She has also continued her career as a journalist, author, and businesswoman, and served in the Presidential campaign of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Personal life

Ferraro was born in Newburgh, New York, the daughter of Italian American parents Antonetta L. (née Corrieri), a seamstress, and Dominick Ferraro, who died when she was eight. Ferraro received her undergraduate degree from Marymount Manhattan College, and a J.D. degree from Fordham University School of Law, going to classes at night while working as a second-grade teacher in public schools during the day. Ferraro graduated from law school in 1960, one of only two women in her graduating class.

She is married to real estate agent John Zaccaro and they have three children.

She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1994, and is a board member of the National Organization of Italian American Women.

In 1998, she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, where plasma cells secrete abnormal antibodies known as Bence-Jones proteins, and has become an avid supporter of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation. She and her husband lived for many years in Forest Hills Gardens, Queens and moved to Manhattan in 2004.

House of Representatives

Ferraro was elected to the House of Representatives from New York's 9th Congressional District in Queens in 1978 and served three two-year terms, compiling a generally liberal voting record on social and economic issues.

While in Congress she served on the Public Works Committee, the Budget Committee, and the Post Office Committee. She also served a term as the Secretary of the House Democratic Caucus, the first woman in that position. She was the Chairwoman of the Platform Committee for the 1984 Democratic National Convention.

Ferraro took a trip to Nicaragua and El Salvador in January 1984, where she spoke to the Contras, and blamed the situation in Central America on the policies of the Reagan Administration.

1984 Vice Presidential candidacy

Mondale selected Geraldine Ferraro to be his Vice Presidential candidate on July 12 1984. Mondale made his decision after interviewing several candidates, including Colorado Sen. Gary Hart, San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros, San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, Philadelphia Mayor Wilson Goode, Kentucky Governor Martha Layne Collins, and Senator Lloyd Bentsen. In her acceptance speech upon being chosen as Mondale's running mate, Ferraro said, "The daughter of an immigrant from Italy has been chosen to run for vice president in the new land my father came to love."

The choice of Ferraro was viewed as a gamble, and pundits were uncertain whether the choice would result in a net gain or loss of votes for the Mondale campaign. However Ferraro noted that prior to choosing a running mate, Mondale was 16 points behind Reagan; after her selection, polling was "dead even.

As a Catholic, Ferraro came under fire from some members of the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church for being pro-choice on abortion.

There was only one Vice Presidential debate between Congresswoman Ferraro and Vice President Bush, which was proclaimed mostly neutral by the press. Ferraro criticized Reagan's actions of refusing to support the Voting Rights Act. Her experience was questioned at the debate and she was asked how her three terms in Congress stacked up with Bush's experience. She strongly defended her position on abortion, which earned her applause and a respectful reply from her opponent, Vice President Bush.

After the debate, Barbara Bush was asked what she thought of Ferraro; she responded, "I can’t say it, but it rhymes with rich. Later that evening, Mrs. Bush called Ferraro to apologize. Ferraro now explains Bush's words as having been said in defense of her own husband; Mrs. Bush had said this after an open microphone had caught George H.W. Bush bragging that he had "kicked a little ass" following the debate.

During the campaign financial questions were raised surrounding the release of Ferraro's husband's tax returns. In July 1984, she said she would release both her and her husband's tax returns. A month later she said she would release only her returns, then she said her husband would release "a financial — a tax statement" on August 20. But Zaccaro initially refused to do so. After the election the House Ethics Committee "found that Ferraro had violated the Ethics in Government Act by failing to disclose details of her family's finances", but "concluded that she acted without 'deceptive intent'."

Post 1984 campaign

In 1992 she ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for the New York Senate seat, finishing second in the primary behind State Attorney General Robert Abrams, ahead of Rev. Al Sharpton and New York City Comptroller and former congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman. She has said that if she had not run for Vice President, she would have sought the Senate seat in 1986.

President Bill Clinton appointed Ferraro ambassador to the United Nations Committee on Human Rights in 1993.

In 1998, Ferraro ran for the Senate again. She started off as the frontrunner for the nomination but lost ground in the late summer months. She finished second behind Congressman Charles Schumer and placed ahead of New York City Public Advocate Mark J. Green.

Media commentator

From 1996 to 1997, she was co-host on Crossfire, a political commentary show on the cable television network CNN. As of March 2008 she holds a position as a political analyst on Fox News Channel and a columnist for the New York Times syndicate.

Business career

Ferraro became a Principal in the government relations practice of Blank Rome law firm on February 1, 2007. Prior to this she was head of the public affairs practice of The Global Consulting Group, an international investor relations and corporate communications firm, where she continues as a Senior Advisor. She is a Board member of Goodrich Petroleum, the National Democratic Institute of International Affairs, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Ferraro had earlier served as president of G&L Strategies, a management consulting firm, and has been connected with many public and private sector organizations, including serving as a director of the former New York Bancorp, Inc., a NYSE-listed company.

2008 presidential campaign involvement

In December 2006, Ferraro announced her support for presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton. Later, she vowed to help defend Clinton from being "swiftboated" in a manner akin to 2004 presidential candidate John Kerry, and assisted with fundraising, with an honorary post on the finance committee for Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign.

In a March 7, 2008, article in the Torrance, California newspaper, The Daily Breeze, Ferraro said regarding Clinton's nomination rival that "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept". Ferraro had made a similar comment in 1984 about Jesse Jackson. Ferraro justified her statements by referring to her own run for vice president saying that she "was talking about historic candidacies and what I started off by saying (was that) if you go back to 1984 and look at my historic candidacy, which I had just talked about all these things, in 1984 if my name was Gerard Ferraro instead of Geraldine Ferraro, I would have never been chosen as a vice presidential candidate. It had nothing to do with my qualification.

Her comments drew criticism and charges of racism from many observers. Although Senator Clinton publicly expressed disagreement with Ferraro's remarks, the Clinton campaign never asked for her resignation. On March 11, again speaking to the Breeze, Ferraro continued to focus on race: "I really think they're attacking me because I'm white. How's that? when explaining her comments. She resigned from Clinton's finance committee the next day, saying that she didn't want the Obama camp to use her comments to hurt Clinton's campaign.

After leaving the Clinton campaign, Ferraro continued to attack Obama on racial issues via her position as a FoxNews contributor. After initially calling the media sexist during the fallout over her initial remarks, Ferraro stated in May 2008 that she thought Obama himself was sexist and that she might not vote for him in the general election.

Books authored

In 1985 she published an autobiography, Ferraro: My Story.

Her second book, a collection of her speeches, was titled Changing History: Women, Power and Politics and was published in 1993.

Framing a Life: A Family Memoir, her 1998 book, is the life story of her immigrant mother.

Electoral history

New York's 9th congressional district, 1978

New York's 9th congressional district, 1980

Battista also ran on Conservative and Right to Life tickets

New York's 9th congressional district, 1982

1984 Democratic National Convention (Vice Presidential tally)

United States presidential election, 1984

Democratic primary for the United States Senate, 1992

Democratic primary for the United States Senate, 1998

See

Notes

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