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Rahm Emanuel

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Rahm Emanuel (born November 29 1959) is an American politician. He has been a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives since 2003, representing (map), which covers much of the North Side of Chicago and parts of suburban Cook County.

Emanuel was chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee for the 2006 elections. After the Democratic Party regained control of the House, he was elected as the next chairman of the Democratic Caucus, making him the fourth-highest ranking Democrat in the House.

Emanuel is noted for his strong partisan style and his fundraising prowess. He is the co-author, with current Democratic Leadership Council President Bruce Reed, of the 2006 book, The Plan: Big Ideas for America. He is a member of the New Democrat Coalition.

Early history

Emanuel was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1959. His father, the Jerusalem-born Benjamin M. Emanuel is a pediatrician, and was a member of the Irgun, a Zionist organization in the 1940s. His mother, Martha Smulevitz, worked as an X-ray technician; she was the daughter of a local union organizer, and would herself become a civil rights activist; she was also once the owner of a Chicago-area rock and roll club. The two met in Chicago in the 1950s. Emanuel's older brother, Ezekiel, is a noted oncologist and bioethicist, and his brother, Ari, is a high-powered talent agent in Los Angeles and inspired Jeremy Piven's character Ari Gold on the HBO series Entourage. Rahm himself is also the inspiration for the character Josh Lyman on The West Wing. He also a younger sister named Shoshanna, fourteen years his junior..

He grew up in Wilmette and attended New Trier High School. Emanuel was encouraged by his mother to take ballet lessons as a boy and is a "graduate of the Evanston School of Ballet". He won "a scholarship to the Joffrey Ballet" but turned this down to attend Sarah Lawrence College, a liberal arts school with a strong dance program. He graduated from college in 1981, and went on to receive a master's degree in Speech and Communication from Northwestern University in 1985. While still a student at Sarah Lawrence, he joined the congressional campaign of David Robinson of Chicago.

Career as political staffer

He began his political career with the consumer rights organization Illinois Public Action. He went on to serve in a number of capacities in local and national politics, initially specializing in fundraising for Illinois campaigns and then nationally.

Emanuel worked for Democrat Paul Simon's 1984 election to the U.S. Senate, was the national campaign director for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 1988, and then was senior advisor and chief fundraiser for Richard M. Daley's victorious campaign for Mayor of Chicago in 1989.

During the 1991 Gulf War, Emanuel was a civilian volunteer in Israel, rust-proofing brakes on an army base in northern Israel.

He joined then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton's presidential primary campaign in 1991, serving as the campaign's Director of Finance. Emanuel insisted that Clinton schedule a lot of time for fundraising and greatly delay campaigning in New Hampshire. After much dispute within the campaign about the issue, Clinton eventually agreed, embarking on an aggressive fundraising campaign across the nation. The fundraising paid off later, providing the campaign a vital buffer to keep buying television time as attacks on Clinton's character threatened to swamp the campaign during the New Hampshire primary.

Clinton's most serious primary rival, Paul Tsongas (the New Hampshire Democratic Primary winner in 1992), later withdrew, citing a lack of campaign funds. Richard Mintz, a Washington public relations consultant who worked with Emanuel on the campaign, spoke about the soundness of the idea: "It was that million dollars that really allowed the campaign to withstand the storm we had to ride out in New Hampshire [over Clinton's alleged relationship with Gennifer Flowers and the controversy over his draft evasion during the Vietnam War]." Emanuel's knowledge of the top donors in the country, and his rapport with potential donors within the Jewish community helped Clinton amass a then-unheard-of $72 million.

Following the campaign, Emanuel became a senior advisor to Bill Clinton at the White House from 1993 to 1998. In the White House, Emanuel was initially Assistant to the President for Political Affairs and then Senior Advisor to the President for Policy and Strategy. He was a leading strategist in the unsuccessful White House efforts to institute universal healthcare and many other Clinton initiatives.

One of his proudest moments during the Clinton Administration "was an event that touched his political sensibilities and his personal ties to Israel: the 1993 Rose Garden signing ceremony after the Oslo accord between Israel and the Palestinians. Rahm directed the details of the ceremony, down to the choreography of the famous handshake between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat."

At this point of his political career he was known for his intensity. Notably, he reportedly told British Prime Minister Tony Blair, "This is important. Don't fuck it up," prior to Blair appearing in public with Clinton for the first time after the Lewinsky scandal emerged. Emanuel is said to have "mailed a rotting fish to a former coworker after the two parted ways." On the night after the Clinton election, "Emanuel was so angry at the president's enemies that he stood up at a celebratory dinner with colleagues from the campaign, grabbed a steak knife and began rattling off a list of betrayers, shouting 'Dead! ... Dead! ... Dead!' and plunging the knife into the table after every name." His "take-no-prisoners attitude" earned him the nickname "Rahm-bo".

People who worked with Emanuel at that time "insist the once hard-charging staffer has mellowed out." He left the White House to accept a well-paid position in investment banking at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein in Chicago, where he worked from 1999 to 2002 and reportedly earned US$18 million.

Congressional career

Emanuel represents Chicago's North Side, and serves on the House Ways and Means Committee. He received 78% of the vote in this Democratic stronghold in the last election.

Emanuel's call to cut off Dick Cheney's executive branch funding of $4.8 million after Cheney asserted he did not fall within the bounds of orders set for the executive branch helped prompt Cheney's office to back down from the claim.

Election in 2002

The US House seat in the 5th District of Illinois was previously held by Rod Blagojevich, who chose not to run for re-election, but instead successfully ran for Governor of Illinois. Emanuel chose to run for this seat. His strongest opponent of the seven other candidates in the 2002 Democratic primary was former Illinois State Representative Nancy Kaszak, who had unsuccessfully opposed Blagojevich in the 1996 primary. The most controversial moment of the primary election came when Edward Moskal, president of the Polish American Congress, a political action committee endorsing Kaszak, called Emanuel a "millionaire carpetbagger who knows nothing" about "our heritage." Moskal also falsely charged that Emanuel had dual citizenship with Israel and had served in the Israeli Army.

Emanuel brought together a coalition of Chicago clergy to denounce the incident. He recalled, “One of the proudest moments of my life was seeing people of my district from all backgrounds demonstrate our common values by coming together in response to this obvious attempt to divide them.” Moskal's comments were denounced as anti-Semitic by many, including Kaszak. Emanuel won the primary and easily defeated Republican candidate Mark Augusti in the general election.

DCCC chairman

Emanuel was named the Chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2005. Prior to his work for Clinton, Emanuel had been an employee of the Committee, which principally serves to recruit candidates for the House and to raise funds to assist both new candidates and incumbents from the Democratic party in an effort to gain Democratic representation in the House.

He declared that in his new role "winning is everything", and he urged Democratic candidates to adopt more centrist positions. Emanuel was known to have had disagreements over Democratic election strategy with Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean. Dean favored a "50 state strategy", building support for the Democratic Party over the long term, while Emanuel believed a more tactical approach, focusing attention on key districts, was necessary to ensure victory.

Ultimately the Democratic Party enjoyed considerable success in the 2006 elections, gaining 30 seats in the House. Emanuel has received considerable praise for his stewardship of the DCCC during this election cycle, even from Illinois Republican Rep. Ray LaHood who said "He legitimately can be called the golden boy of the Democratic Party today. He recruited the right candidates, found the money and funded them, and provided issues for them. Rahm did what no one else could do in seven cycles. Despite this, some of the victories did come in areas that had trended strongly Republican in recent years (such as Nancy Boyda's defeat of Jim Ryun in Kansas) providing a boost to Dean's idea as well.

Emanuel still is close to Bill Clinton and as the chairman of the DCCC talked strategy with him at least once a month. As a Clinton loyalist, he declared in April 2006 that he would support Hillary Rodham Clinton should she pursue the presidency in 2008. However, Emanuel's loyalties came into conflict when his home-state senator Barack Obama expressed interest in the race; asked in January 2007 about his stance on the Democratic presidential nomination, he said: "I'm hiding under the desk. I'm very far under the desk, and I'm bringing my paper and my phone.

House leadership

After his role in helping the Democrats to win the 2006 elections, Emanuel was believed to be a leading candidate for the position of Majority Whip. Nancy Pelosi, who became the next Speaker of the House, persuaded him not to challenge Jim Clyburn, but instead to succeed Clyburn in the role of Democratic Caucus Chairman. In return, Pelosi agreed to assign the caucus chair more responsibilities, including "aspects of strategy and messaging, incumbent retention, policy development and rapid-response communications". Current caucus vice-chair John Larson will stay in this role instead of running for the chairman position.

Political views

During his original 2002 campaign, Emanuel "indicated his support of President Bush's position on Iraq, but said he believed the president needed to better articulate his position to the American people." Inspired by his pediatrician father of the major goals he spoke of during the race was "to help make health care affordable and available for all Americans."

Emanuel has maintained a 100% pro-choice voting record and is generally liberal on social issues. He has aligned himself with the Democratic Leadership Council and the party's centrist wing, but is not among its more conservative members.

Controversies

Speculation has been raised regarding the connection of Emanuel's Congressional election success to convicted former Chicago water department boss Don Tomczak. There is no evidence of any involvement by Emanuel in Tomczak's illegal activities.

The newspaper USA Today reported in late January 2007 that Emanuel failed to disclose that he was an officer of a family charity , a violation of law requiring members of Congress to report non-profit leadership roles. Last year former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist(R) also neglected to report his role in a family charity. Both politicians agreed to update their disclosures and no action was taken against them.

Committee Assignments

  • Ways and Means Committee

    • Subcommittee on Health
    • Subcommittee on Select Revenue Measures

Electoral history

U.S. House, 5th District of Illinois (General Election)
Year Winning candidate Party Pct Opponent Party Pct Opponent Party Pct
2002 Rahm Emanuel Democratic 67% Mark Augusti Republican 29% Frank Gonzalez Libertarian 4%
2004 Rahm Emanuel (inc.) Democratic 76% Bruce Best Republican 24%
2006 Rahm Emanuel (inc.) Democratic 78% Kevin White Republican 22%

Personal life

His father, a pediatrician still practicing near Chicago, immigrated to the United States from Israel and spoke Hebrew with his son, when Emanuel was a boy.

Emanuel lost part of his right middle finger to a meat slicer while an employee at Arby's as a teenager.

Emanuel's wife Amy Rule, a graduate of Wharton School of Business, was non-practicing before converting to Orthodox Judaism around the same time as her wedding. Amy is “heavily involved with the Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School in Lakeview, Ill.” They have three children, son Zacharias and daughters Ilana and Leah. Zacharias attends "the Conservative Jewish day school, which Emanuel himself attended as a child". Rabbi Asher Lopatin of Anshe Shalom, is quoted as saying: "It's a very involved Jewish family"; "Amy was one of the teachers for a class for children during the High Holidays two years ago." Emanuel has said of his Judaism: "I am proud of my heritage and treasure the values it has taught me." Emanuel's family lives on the North Side of Chicago, in the Roscoe Village neighborhood.

Emanuel trains for and participates in triathlons.

From work earlier in his career, Emanuel considers Mayor Richard M. Daley, Senator Paul Simon and President Bill Clinton to be his professional mentors. He considers his personal mentors to be his father and mother.

Trivia

Bradley Whitford's character Josh Lyman on NBC television series The West Wing is said to be based on Emanuel.

He made a cameo appearance at the same restaurant as Josh Lyman in the 7th season episode "The Wedding."

His first name, Rahm, means "high" or "lofty" in Hebrew.. His last name, Emanuel, means "God is with us".

He was in a one-man Klezmer band called Rahmbunctious Eman.

He has advised colleagues not to appear on the popular television show The Colbert Report.

References

Works

External links

Bendavid, Naftali The Thumpin': How Rahm Emanuel and the Democrats Learned to Be Ruthless and Ended the Republican Revolution, Doubleday (May 8, 2007), ISBN 978-0385523288Articles



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Last updated on Monday March 10, 2008 at 08:04:57 PDT (GMT -0700)
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