Who is senator feingold

Kennedy Library Foundation, family, and friends. To all of you, I extend my gratitude as I accept this magnificent award. You have deeply touched me and all of us who have revered the Kennedy name in Wisconsin for nearly a half century.

I share this award with family, loyal staff, friends and supporters. To receive a call from Caroline Kennedy explaining that Senator McCain and I had won this award was not only thrilling but reminded me of how throughout my life, directly or indirectly, the Kennedy family has inspired me.

This is especially true of Senator Ted Kennedy. It is a joy to work with him, to have had him introduce me for my first speech on the floor of the Senate and to follow his lead on so many issues from health care to human rights. Anyone who really follows the Senate knows one sometimes overlooked fact: Ted Kennedy is one of the most skilled, one of the most passionate, and easily one of the best United States Senators of the 20th century.

I'm holding in my hand my own original cent copy of Profiles in Courage that I read as a young teenager. I loved it. It fueled my not very well hidden interest in going into politics and maybe even becoming a U.

But its influence was not simply to make me want to be a senator. Rather, this thin little book spoke volumes about what kind of a senator it is worthwhile to be. What Profiles in Courage illustrates is the role risk and sacrifice can or should play in a career in public service. Now, I am under no illusions about the different degrees of risk or sacrifice that public service can entail.

There can be no comparison to the sacrifices of the Kennedy family. There can be no comparison to the sacrifices of a John McCain. What these people have given us, however, is a sense of what courage means. As I was preparing to run for reelection in , I was hoping to win and to return to much unfinished business for Wisconsin and the nation including my bipartisan efforts with John McCain to pass our bill. In the spirit of our legislation, I decided to voluntarily limit my spending in the manner that we hope will become the practice for all candidates.

I did not plan for it to be dramatic, and would have been quite content with an easy win. But the situation reminded me just a little bit of President Kennedy's response to a young boy who asked him, "How did you become a war hero? I simply decided I could not justify being reelected on that basis. But this was not an attempt at political suicide.

I honestly believed that if I limited my spending, the people of Wisconsin would see what was happening and would take control. And they did. But for me this award is not about recommending unilateral spending limits to other candidates.

It is about the crying need to pass real campaign finance reform, so that all candidates would have to abide by some reasonable and fair rules. That's what the McCain-Feingold bill is about. And when it comes to that bill, the real courage is on the McCain side of the equation. It was John McCain who was in the majority when be proposed this idea.

It was John McCain who was willing to accept a number of ideas which have sometimes been associated with Democratic bills. It is John McCain who has consistently stood up to his own leadership. And it is John McCain who knows that his presidential primary opponents may try to use that bipartisanship against him. But I know that for him, this is a matter of honor. I believe I can speak for both of us when I say this award is the ideal way to spur us on to get the last few votes we need to break the filibuster and put an end to this system of legalized bribery that has overtaken our democracy.

Before introducing my co-recipient, I want to again thank the Kennedy Library Foundation and the Kennedy family. I want to thank the people of Wisconsin who showed that things could still be done another way, just as Wisconsinites did years ago with the advent of the Progressive movement under the leadership of Fighting Bob LaFollette. Wisconsin has always been a beacon for the nation when it comes to clean government. And most importantly, I want to thank President John F. Contact Sophie Carson at or scarson gannett.

Our subscribers make this reporting possible. Please consider supporting local journalism by subscribing to the Journal Sentinel at jsonline. Facebook Twitter Email. Russ is the Honorary Ambassador for the Campaign for Nature which is a global effort calling on policymakers to commit to address the growing biodiversity crisis.

The Campaign seeks a science-driven, ambitious new deal for nature at the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in Kunming, China, in Russ holds a B. Senate seat was one of nine competitive battleground races in that helped Republicans maintain control of the Senate. In a rematch of the election, Johnson topped Feingold for a second time to retain his Senate seat.

Johnson, who trailed in the polls for most of the election, was able to tighten the race as Election Day neared by producing ads that showed his personal side. According to The Milwaukee Wisconsin Journal Sentinel , Johnson and his brother Dean, a co-host and the executive producer of the PBS series "Hometime," "brainstormed ideas that would turn into personal and effective ads that showed Johnson in a favorable light.

As the race grew tighter, Johnson was also able to attack Feingold in the final weeks of the election with the help of national Republicans who initially thought that the seat was a lost cause. When asked about the last minute outside helped, Johnson said, "I wish I would have had the cavalry show up in June, July, August when Feingold was using his little moneymaking machine to out resource me.

I guess, better late than never. Johnson, who defeated Feingold by three percentage points, said that he "was surprised" by his victory margin. In his victory speech, Johnson said, "I believe America has given us a chance, an opportunity to put this nation on the right path. It's exactly what I intend to do. The following issues were listed on Feingold's campaign website. For a full list of campaign themes, click here. The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Russ Feingold Wisconsin Senate.

These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles. Russ Feingold - Google News. What's on my ballot? Elections in How to vote How to run for office Ballot measures. Who represents me?