The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence.^[1] It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current Chairman is Broadway theatre producer Rocco Landesman.^[2][3][4] The NEA has its offices in the Old Post Office building, in Washington, D.C. It was awarded Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre in 1995.

Background[link]

The NEA is "dedicated to supporting excellence in the arts, both new and established; bringing the arts to all Americans; and providing leadership in arts education".^[1]

Between 1965 and 2008, the agency has made in excess of 128,000 grants, totaling more than $4 billion. From the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, Congress granted the NEA an annual funding of between US$160 and US$180 million. In 1996, Congress cut the NEA funding to US$99.5 million as a result of pressure from conservative groups, including the American Family Association, who criticized the agency for using tax dollars to fund highly controversial artists such as Robert Clark Young, Barbara Degenevieve, Andres Serrano, Robert Mapplethorpe, and the performance artists known as the "NEA Four". Since 1996, the NEA has partially rebounded with a 2004 budget of US$121 million.^[5] For FY 2008, the budget is US$144.7 million.^[6] For FY 2009, the budget is US$155 million.^[7] For FY 2010, the budget reached the level it was at during the mid-1990s at US$167.5 million^[7] but fell again in FY 2011 with a budget of $154 million.^[7]

Governance[link]

The NEA is governed by a Chairman appointed by the President to a 4 year term. The National Council on the Arts advises the Chairman on policies and programs, as well as reviewing grant applications, fundraising guidelines, and leadership initiative. This body consists of fourteen individuals appointed by the President for their expertise and knowledge in the arts, in addition to six ex officio members of Congress who serve in a non-voting capacity.^[8]

Grantmaking[link]

The NEA offers grants in the categories of: 1) Grants for Arts Projects, 2) National Initiatives, and 3) Partnership Agreements. Grants for Arts Projects support exemplary projects in the discipline categories of artist communities, arts education, dance, design, folk and traditional arts, literature, local arts agencies, media arts, museums, music, musical theater, opera, presenting (including multidisciplinary art forms), theater, and visual arts. The NEA also grants individual fellowships in literature to creative writers and translators of exceptional talent in the areas of prose and poetry. The NEA has partnerships in the areas of state and regional, federal, international activities, and design. The state arts agencies and regional arts organizations are the NEA’s primary partners in serving the American people through the arts. Forty percent of all NEA funding goes to the state arts agencies and regional arts organizations. Additionally, the NEA awards three Lifetime Honors: NEA National Heritage Fellowships to master folk and traditional artists, NEA Jazz Masters Fellowships to jazz musicians and advocates, and NEA Opera Honors to individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to opera in the United States. The NEA also manages the National Medal of Arts, awarded annually by the President.

The NEA is the largest grantmaker to arts organizations in the nation.

Controversy[link]

1981 attempts to abolish[link]

Ronald Reagan intended to push Congress to abolish the NEA completely over a three-year period upon entering the office in 1981. However, this plan was abandoned when the president's special task force on the arts and humanities, which included close Reagan allies such as conservatives Charlton Heston and Joseph Coors, discovered "the needs involved and benefits of past assistance", concluding that continued federal support was important.^[9]

1989 objections[link]

In 1989, Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association held a press conference attacking what he called "anti-Christian bigotry," in an exhibition by photographer Andres Serrano. The work at the center of the controversy was Piss Christ, a photo of a plastic crucifix submerged in a vial of an amber fluid described by the artist as his own urine.^[10] Republican Senators Jesse Helms and Al D'Amato began to rally against the NEA, and expanded the attack to include other artists. Prominent conservative Christian figures including Pat Robertson of the 700 Club and Pat Buchanan joined the attacks. Republican representative Dick Armey, an opponent of federal arts funding, began to attack a planned exhibition of photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe at the Corcoran Museum of Art that was to receive NEA support.

On June 12, 1989, The Corcoran cancelled the Mapplethorpe exhibition, saying that it did not want to "adversely affect the NEA's congressional appropriations."The Washington Project for the Arts later hosted the Mapplethorpe show. This action was highly criticized and in September, 1989, the Director of the Corcoran gallery, Christina Orr-Cahill, issued a formal statement of apology saying, "The Corcoran Gallery of Art in attempting to defuse the NEA funding controversy by removing itself from the political spotlight, has instead found itself in the center of controversy. By withdrawing from the Mapplethorpe exhibition, we, the board of trustees and the director, have inadvertently offended many members of the arts community which we deeply regret. Our course in the future will be to support art, artists and freedom of expression."^[11]

Though this controversy inspired congressional debate about appropriations to the NEA, including proposed restrictions on the content of NEA-supported work and their grantmaking guidelines, efforts to defund the NEA failed.^[12]

1990 performance artists vetoed[link]

Conservative media continued to attack individual artists whose NEA-supported work was deemed controversial. The "NEA Four", Karen Finley, Tim Miller, John Fleck, and Holly Hughes, were performance artists whose proposed grants from the United States government's National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) were vetoed by John Frohnmayer in June 1990. Grants were overtly vetoed on the basis of subject matter after the artists had successfully passed through a peer review process. The artists won their case in court in 1993 and were awarded amounts equal to the grant money in question, though the case would make its way to the United States Supreme Court in National Endowment for the Arts v. Finley.^[13] The case centered on subsection (d)(1) of 20 U.S.C. § 954 which provides that the NEA Chairperson shall ensure that artistic excellence and artistic merit are the criteria by which applications are judged. The court ruled in 524 U.S. 569 (1998), that Section 954(d)(1) is facially valid, as it neither inherently interferes with First Amendment rights nor violates constitutional vagueness principles.

1995-1997 congressional attacks[link]

The Republican revolution of 1994 cleared the way for House Speaker Newt Gingrich to lead a renewed attack on the NEA. Gingrich had called for the NEA to be eliminated completely along with the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. While some in Congress attacked the funding of controversial artists, others argued the endowment was wasteful and elitist.^[14] However, despite massive budget cutbacks and the end of grants to individual artists, Gingrich ultimately failed in his push to eliminate the endowment.^{[citation needed]}

2009 conference call[link]

In mid-2009, the NEA came under controversy again when it was revealed on a website run by conservative activist Andrew Breitbart that then-Communications Director Yosi Sergant had participated in an August 10, 2009 conference call that allegedly directed artists to create works of art promoting President Barack Obama's domestic agenda.^[15][16] "I would encourage you to pick something, whether it’s health care, education, the environment, you know, there’s four key areas that the corporation has identified as the areas of service," Sergant said on the call, making reference to the four areas of focus earlier outlined by Nell Abernathy, Director of Outreach for United We Serve. Suggested areas of focus mentioned in the call included preventative care, child nutrition, community cleanups, trail maintenance, reading tutoring, and homelessness. At another point he said, "This is just the beginning. This is the first telephone call of a brand new conversation. We are just now learning how to really bring this community together to speak with the government. What that looks like legally. We're still trying to figure out the laws of putting government websites of Facebook and the use of Twitter. This is all being sorted out. We are participating in history as it's being made, so bear with us as we learn the language so that we can speak to each other safely. And we can really work together to move the needle to get stuff done."^[17][18] Some journalists speculated that this was evidence that Sergant was aware of the possibility he might be crossing the line into advocacy. At the time of the call, the federal government was drafting new policies concerning federal agencies' use of social media; these were released the following month.^[19]

The NEA countered the allegations by asserting that Sergant had acted unilaterally and without the approval of then-Acting Chairman Patrice Walker Powell, and that the call was not a means to promote any legislative agenda but rather to inform members of the arts community of an opportunity to become involved in volunteerism through the United We Serve program. They also noted that the call had nothing to do with grantmaking.^[20]

Chairpersons[link]

• 1965-1969 Roger L. Stevens, appointed by Lyndon B. Johnson
• 1969-1977 Nancy Hanks, appointed by Richard M. Nixon
• 1977-1981 Livingston L. Biddle, Jr., appointed by Jimmy Carter
• 1981-1989 Frank Hodsoll, appointed by Ronald Reagan.
• 1989-1992 John Frohnmayer, appointed by George H. W. Bush
• 1993-1997 Jane Alexander, appointed by Bill Clinton
• 1998-2001 Bill Ivey, appointed by Bill Clinton
• 2002 Michael P. Hammond, appointed by George W. Bush
• 2003-2009 Dana Gioia, appointed by George W. Bush
• 2009 Patrice Walker Powell, Acting Chairman, appointed by Barack Obama^[21][22]
• 2009 Rocco Landesman, appointed by Barack Obama^[4]

See also[link]

• National Endowment for the Humanities
• National Heritage Fellowship
• List of music organizations in the United States
• National Medal of Arts winners
• NEA Jazz Masters
• National Council for the Traditional Arts
• New York City Department of Cultural Affairs

References[link]

• National Endowment for the Arts (2000). The National Endowment for the Arts 1965-2000: A Brief Chronology of Federal Support for the Arts. Washington, DC: National Endowment for the Arts. OCLC 52401250. http://www.nea.gov/about/Chronology/Chronology.html. Retrieved 2008-05-24. 

Further reading[link]

• Alexander, Jane. Command Performance: an Actress in the Theater of Politics. Public Affairs, a member of the Perseus Book Group; New York, NY, 2000. ISBN 0-306-81044-1
• Binkiewicz, Donna M. Federalizing the Muse: United States Arts Policy and the National Endowment for the Arts, 1965-1980, University of North Carolina Press, 312pp., 2004. ISBN 0-8078-2878-5.
• Napoleon, Davi. Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater This history of a theater in Brooklyn that won critical acclaim but could not always get funding to finish planned seasons is in part a case study of the arts funding crisis in America. Iowa State University Press.

External links[link]

• National Endowment for the Arts website

Charles Thomas "Chuck" Close (born July 5, 1940) is an American painter and photographer who achieved fame as a photorealist, through his massive-scale portraits. Though a catastrophic spinal artery collapse in 1988 left him severely paralyzed, he has continued to paint and produce work that remains sought after by museums and collectors.

Life and work[link]

Close was born in Monroe, Washington.^[1] His father died when he was eleven years old. Most of his early works are very large portraits based on photographs (Photorealism or Hyperrealism technique) of family and friends, often other artists. In an interview with Phong Bui in The Brooklyn Rail, Close describes an early encounter with a Jackson Pollock painting at the Seattle Art Museum: "I went to the Seattle Art Museum with my mother for the first time when I was 11. I saw this Jackson Pollock drip painting with aluminum paint, tar, gravel and all that stuff. I was absolutely outraged, disturbed. It was so far removed from what I thought art was. However, within 2 or 3 days, I was dripping paint all over my old paintings. In a way I’ve been chasing that experience ever since."^[2]

In 1962, he received his B.A. from the University of Washington in Seattle. He then attended graduate school at Yale University, where he received his MFA in 1964. After Yale, he lived in Europe for a while on a Fulbright grant. When he returned to the US, he worked as an art teacher at the University of Massachusetts.

Close had been known for his skillful brushwork as a graduate student at Yale University. As he explained in a 2009 interview with the Cleveland Ohio Plain Dealer, he made a choice in 1967 to make art hard for himself and force a personal artistic breakthrough by abandoning the paintbrush. "I threw away my tools", Close said. "I chose to do things I had no facility with. The choice not to do something is in a funny way more positive than the choice to do something. If you impose a limit to not do something you've done before, it will push you to where you've never gone before."^[3]

Close's first one-man show was in 1970. His work was first exhibited at the New York Museum of Modern Art in early 1973. In 1979 his work was included in the Whitney Biennial. "One demonstration of the way photography became assimilated into the art world is the success of photorealist painting in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is also called super-realism or hyper-realism and painters like Richard Estes, Denis Peterson, Audrey Flack, and Chuck Close often worked from photographic stills to create paintings that appeared to be photographs. The everyday nature of the subject matter of the paintings likewise worked to secure the painting as a realist object."^[4]

One photo of Philip Glass was included in his black and white series in 1969, redone with water colors in 1977, again redone with stamp pad and fingerprints in 1978, and also done as gray handmade paper in 1982.

Close suffers from Prosopagnosia, also known as face blindness, in which he is unable to recognize faces. By painting portraits, he is better able to recognize and remember faces.^[5] On the subject, Close has said, "I was not conscious of making a decision to paint portraits because I have difficulty recognizing faces. That occurred to me twenty years after the fact when I looked at why I was still painting portraits, why that still had urgency for me. I began to realize that it has sustained me for so long because I have difficulty in recognizing faces."^[6]

Although his later paintings differ in method from his earlier canvases, the preliminary process remains the same. To create his grid work copies of photos, Close puts a grid on the photo and on the canvas and copies cell by cell. Typically, each square within the grid is filled with roughly executed regions of color (usually consisting of painted rings on a contrasting background) which give the cell a perceived 'average' hue which makes sense from a distance. His first tools for this included an airbrush, rags, razor blade, and an eraser mounted on a power drill. His first picture with this method was Big Self Portrait, a black and white enlargement of his face to a 107.5 in by 83.5 in (2.73 m by 2.12 m) canvas, made in over four months in 1968, and acquired by the Walker Art Center in 1969. He made seven more black and white portraits during this period. He has been quoted as saying that he used such diluted paint in the airbrush that all eight of the paintings were made with a single tube of mars black acrylic.

Later work has branched into non-rectangular grids, topographic map style regions of similar colors, CMYK color grid work, and using larger grids to make the cell by cell nature of his work obvious even in small reproductions. The Big Self Portrait is so finely done that even a full page reproduction in an art book is still indistinguishable from a regular photograph.

Close has also continued to explore difficult photographic processes such as daguerreotype in collaboration with Jerry Spagnoli and sophisticated modular/cell-based forms such as tapestry. Close's photogravure portrait of artist Robert Rauschenberg, “Robert” (1998), appeared in a 2009 exhibition at the Heckscher Museum of Art in Huntington, New York, featuring prints from Universal Limited Art Editions.^[7] Close's wall-size tapestry portraits, in which each image is composed of thousands of combinations of woven colored thread, depict subjects including Kate Moss, Cindy Sherman, Lorna Simpson, Lucas Samaras, Philip Glass, and Close himself.^[8] They are produced in collaboration with Donald Farnsworth of Magnolia Editions in Oakland, CA.^[9]

In 2000, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.^[10]

Close currently lives and paints in Bridgehampton, New York. He has been represented by The Pace Gallery, in New York since 1977.^[11]

Close appeared on The Colbert Report on August 12, 2010, where he admitted he watches the show every night.

Christopher Finch wrote a biography, Chuck Close: Life, which was published in 2010, a sequel of sorts to Finch’s 2007 book, Chuck Close: Work, a career-spanning monograph.^[12]

"The Event"[link]

On December 7, 1988, Close felt a strange pain in his chest. That day he was at a ceremony honoring local artists in New York City and was waiting to be called to the podium to present an award. Close delivered his speech and then made his way across the street to Beth Israel Medical Center where he suffered a seizure which left him paralyzed from the neck down. The cause was diagnosed as a spinal artery collapse.^[13] Close called that day "The Event". For months, Close was in rehab strengthening his muscles with physical therapy; he soon had slight movement in his arms and could walk, yet only for a few steps. He has relied on a wheelchair since.

However, Close continued to paint with a brush strapped onto his wrist with tape, creating large portraits in low-resolution grid squares created by an assistant. Viewed from afar, these squares appear as a single, unified image which attempt photo-reality, albeit in pixelated form. Although the paralysis restricted his ability to paint as meticulously as before, Close had, in a sense, placed artificial restrictions upon his hyperrealist approach well before the injury. That is, he adopted materials and techniques that did not lend themselves well to achieving a photorealistic effect. Small bits of irregular paper or inked fingerprints were used as media to achieve astoundingly realistic and interesting results. Close proved able to create his desired effects even with the most difficult of materials to control. He spoke candidly about the impact disability had on his life and work in the book Chronicles of Courage: Very Special Artists written by Jean Kennedy Smith and George Plimpton and published by Random House.^[14]

See also[link]

• List of Chuck Close subjects
• The Portrait Now

References[link]

Sources[link]

• Bartman, William; Joanne Kesten (editors) (1997). The Portraits Speak: Chuck Close in Conversation with 27 of his subjects. A.R.T. Press, New York. ISBN 0-923183-18-3. 
• Greenberg, Jan; Sandra Jordan (1998). Chuck Close Up Close. DK Publishing. ISBN 0-7894-2658-7. 
• Wei, Lilly (essay) (2009). Chuck Close: Selected Paintings and Tapestries 2005-2009. PaceWildenstein. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/978-1-930743-99-8|978-1-930743-99-8]]. 

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Chuck Close

• The Pace Gallery
• Watch Chuck Close and Robert Storr in Conversation on BUniverse
• Watch/listen to full episode of KCRW's "Art Talk: Close-Up on Chuck Close"
• "Close Encounters," artNet Magazine, 8-05-08.
• "Close Call" By Jon Marmor
• Chuck Close at the Museum of Modern Art
• Chuck Close at the Walker Art Center
• Images of Chuck Close tapestries
• Chuck Close: Process & Collaboration
• Habits of Disbelief: Chuck Close by John Haber
• Book Review of "A Couple Ways of Doing Something"
• Images of Chuck Close Prints
• Antiques Roadshow segment with a Chuck Close abstract painting

Interviews[link]

• Smithsonian Archives of American Art: Interview, 1987
• Finding the Color World: Interview with Chuck Close, 2002
• Chuck Close and Bob Holman in Conversation, 2006
• One hour interview with Charlie Rose at Google Video (March 15, 2007)
• Chuck Close Q&A with Men's Vogue
• Chuck Close with Phong Bui The Brooklyn Rail, June 2008
• URBAN-MUSE.COM interview with Chuck Close at his NYC Studio (Young Artists and 9/11)
• "Close-Up," Chuck Close interviewed by biographer Christopher Finch in Guernica Magazine

Jim Moran
Official Congressional portrait from 2006
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia's 8th district
Incumbent
Assumed office January 3, 1991
Preceded by	Stanford Parris
Mayor of Alexandria, Virginia
In office 1985–1990
Preceded by	Charles E. Beatley
Succeeded by	Patsy Ticer
Personal details
Born	James Patrick Moran, Jr. (1945-05-16) May 16, 1945 (age 67) Buffalo, New York, U.S.
Political party	Democratic
Spouse(s)	LuAnn L. Bennett (m. 2004–2006) Mary Howard (1988–2003)
Relations	James Patrick Moran (father) Brian Moran (brother)
Children	Four
Residence	Arlington, Virginia, U.S.
Alma mater	College of the Holy Cross (B.A.) University of Pittsburgh (M.P.A.)
Occupation	Investment broker Federal employee
Signature
Website	Official House website Campaign website

James Patrick "Jim" Moran, Jr. ( /mɵˈræn/; born May 16, 1945) is the U.S. Representative for Virginia's 8th congressional district, serving since 1991. He is a member of the Democratic Party. The district is located in Northern Virginia and includes the cities of Falls Church and Alexandria, all of Arlington County, and a portion of Fairfax County.

Jim Moran was the mayor of Alexandria, Virginia for five years from 1985 to 1990, when he resigned to run for Congress. He defeated Republican incumbent Stanford Parris in the general election on November 6, 1990, and was sworn in the following January. Since then he has served ten consecutive terms as a member of the Congress. He is of Irish descent and is the son of professional football player James Patrick Moran, Sr. and the brother of Democratic Party of Virginia Chairman Brian Moran.

Early life, education, and business career[link]

Moran, the oldest of seven children, was born in Buffalo, New York, and grew up in Natick, Massachusetts, a working-class suburb west of Boston. His parents were Dorothy (Dwyer) and James Patrick Moran, Sr., a professional football player for the Boston Redskins in 1935 and 1936; outside of football he worked as a probation officer.^[1] Both his father and mother were Roosevelt Democrats and supporters of the New Deal. Moran attended Marian High School in Framingham, Massachusetts.

Moran played college football on an athletic scholarship at the College of the Holy Cross,^[2] where his father had been a football star in the early 1930s. Moran was awarded a B.A. in economics in 1967. In 1970 he received a Master of Public Administration from the University of Pittsburgh. During a campaign in 1992, Moran admitted that he had tried marijuana during his early twenties.^[3]

After a brief career as a stockbroker, and attending graduate school, Moran moved to Washington, D.C.^[2]

Early political career[link]

He worked for five years at the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, as a budget officer, then became a senior specialist for budgetary and fiscal policy at the Library of Congress. His final position, from 1976 to 1979, was on the staff of U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations.^[4]

In 1979, Moran was elected to the Alexandria, Virginia, City Council. He was deputy mayor from 1982 until his resignation in 1984 as part of a nolo contendere plea bargain to a misdemeanor conflict of interest charge, which courts later erased. The incident stemmed from charges that Moran had used money from a political action committee to rent a tuxedo and buy Christmas cards; both of which were later judged by the Commonwealth Attorney to "fit the definition of constituent services", and were dismissed.^[5]

In 1985 Moran was elected Mayor of Alexandria. He was reelected in 1988,^[6] and resigned after he was elected to Congress in November 1990.

U.S. House of Representatives[link]

Elections[link]

In 1990, Moran first won election to the United States House of Representatives, defeating Republican incumbent Stanford Parris. During the campaign, Parris compared Moran to Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein; saying that "The only three people I know who support Saddam Hussein's position are Moammar Gadhafi, Yasser Arafat and Jim Moran." Moran angrily responded by saying that Parris was a "a deceitful, fatuous jerk", and that he wanted "to break his nose".^[7][8] Moran's well-financed campaign also focused on Parris' opposition to abortion. Moran upset Parris, winning by 7.1 percent.^[9] He was sworn into office in January 1991.^[10][10]

In the next two elections, Moran faced Republican lawyer Kyle McSlarrow. During the 1992 campaign, McSlarrow accused Moran of "lying to the public". Moran responded by portraying McSlarrow as a drug abuser, referring to the candidate's admitted use of cocaine and marijuana while at the University of Virginia.^[11] Moran compared McSlarrow to Parris, saying that Parris had "[t]en times more integrity than McSlarrow. He didn't create lies."^[12] In 1994, Moran's daughter Dorothy was suffering from an inoperable brain tumor. (She is still alive as of 2011.) During the campaign, neither Moran or McSlarrow used the negative tactics of two years earlier. On his campaign strategy that election, McSlarrow said "It would not be a community service to shut down this campaign, but I probably will not talk much about Moran."^[13]

In 1998 and 2000, Moran faced Republican and flat tax advocate Demaris H. Miller. In the 1998 campaign Miller accused Moran of flip-flopping in his support of President Bill Clinton, after Moran, who had been a vocal supporter of the Clinton White House, voted in favor of opening an impeachment inquiry following the Monica Lewinsky scandal.^[14]

In 2008, Moran beat a primary challenger with 86% of the vote. In the general election, he faced Republican Mark Ellmore and Independent Green Ron Fisher. He won with 68 percent of the vote to Elmore's 30 percent.^[15]

In November 2009 Ellmore announced he would again challenge Moran, but dropped out of the race four months later.^[16] In the June 2010 Republican primary, attorney Matthew Berry narrowly lost to retired U.S. Army Colonel J. Patrick Murray, after a last-minute mailing attacking Berry's homosexuality.^[17][18] Fisher again was on the ballot.^[19] During the campaign, Moran was criticized by military advocacy groups and conservatives for saying, at a local Democratic committee meeting, that Murray had not "served or performed any kind of public service".^{[20][21][22][23]} Moran responded by commending Murray's military service, while saying that he used the phrase in relation to Murray not having engaged in "local civic engagement" and not having served in local office.^[24] In November 2010, Moran was re-elected to an eleventh term with 61% of the vote.^[25]

Tenure[link]

Moran represents Virginia's 8th congressional district, an area in Northern Virginia that is just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C.; the district includes Arlington county, and the cities of Alexandria and Falls Church. The redistricting that followed the 2000 census also gave Moran a portion of Reston, Virginia. His district is located in the Dulles Technology Corridor and is the home of many federal defense contractors as well as a significant number of those who work in the information technology industry. Many federal employees also reside within the district, mostly due to its proximity to Washington and because both the United States Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency, among others, are headquartered there.^[26]

During the mid nineties, Moran co-founded and later co-chaired the Democratic Leadership Council, a coalition of Democratic lawmakers who consider themselves to be moderates with regard to commerce, budgeting, and economic legislation, but vote as a liberal on social issues.^[27] Moran is also a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), the largest caucus operating within the Democratic caucus, which works to advance progressive issues and opinions. He joined the caucus prior to the 111th Congress.^[28][29]

1990s[link]

In 1995, Moran had to be restrained by the Capitol Police after a shoving match with California Republican Duke Cunningham on the house floor over President Bill Clinton's decision to send U.S. troops to Bosnia. "I thought he had been bullying too many people for too long, and I told him so," Moran recalled. "He said he didn't mean to be so accusatory ... After that, he would bring me candy from California." Moran said that after the encounter he found Cunningham crying in the cloakroom.^[30]

During the final years of the Clinton administration, Moran was critical of the President: In 1998, during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Moran was one of only 31 House Democrats to support launching a formal impeachment inquiry into President Bill Clinton. He told Time magazine that "This whole sordid mess is just too tawdry and tedious and embarrassing ... It's like a novel that just became too full of juicy parts and bizarre, sleazy characters."^[31] Moran is also reported to have told First Lady Hillary Clinton that if she had been his sister, he would have punched her husband in the nose. Moran eventually decided not to vote for impeachment, explaining that Clinton had not compromised the country's security, and that he still respected him for what he had accomplished as President. Moran proposed a resolution demanding that Clinton confess to a pattern of "dishonest and illegal conduct" surrounding his sexual involvement with Monica Lewinsky.^[32][33]

2000s[link]

Moran has been voted High Technology Legislator of the Year by the Information Technology Industry Council and has been voted into the American Electronics Association Hall of Fame for his work on avoiding the Year 2000 crisis and his support of the IT Industry and defense contractors in Northern Virginia. He cosponsored failed bills in 2005 to provide the District of Columbia with a House seat and to prohibit slaughter of horses.^[34][35]

On April 28, 2006, Moran, along with four other members of Congress (the now-deceased Rep. Tom Lantos of California, Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas, and James McGovern and John Olver of Massachusetts), and six other activists, was arrested for disorderly conduct in front of the Sudanese embassy in Washington, D.C., and spent 45 minutes in a jail cell before being released. They were protesting the alleged role of Sudan's government in ethnic cleansing in Darfur. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, "Their protest and civil disobedience was designed to embarrass the military dictatorship's ongoing genocide of its non-Arab citizens."^[36]

The day after the Virginia Tech Massacre in 2007, Moran told a local radio station that the assault weapons ban should be reinstated and blamed the National Rifle Association, which he accused of getting a "free ride", and President George W. Bush for blocking gun control legislation. He further warned that if gun control legislation was not passed, then shootings such as the one at Virginia Tech will happen "time and time again." He later dismissed charges that he was politicizing the shooting, telling Politico that "as a legislator, your immediate reaction is to think something could be done to avoid this. I don't know why the idea of figuring out how to avoid it is a political partisan issue."^[37]

Shortly before the June 2008 Virginia Democratic primary, Moran endorsed Senator Barack Obama of Illinois for the presidency over New York Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton. Explaining his endorsement, he told a local newspaper that the long term goal of closing Alexandria's coal-fired power plant would be more attainable under Obama than under Clinton. Obama won the Virginia primary, and carried the state when he won the general election in November.^[38]

In May 2009, Moran introduced a bill that would restrict broadcast advertisements for erectile dysfunction or male enhancement medication. He said that such ads were indecent and should be prohibited on radio and television between the hours of 6 am and 10 pm, in accordance with Federal Communications Commission policy. Later that year, Moran and former presidential candidate and former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean held a town hall meeting on the issue of health care at South Lakes High School in Reston, Virginia. The meeting was interrupted several times by protesters, most notably pro-life activist Randall Terry, who, along with about half a dozen supporters, caused such a commotion that he had to be escorted out by police. The incident was replayed several times over the next few weeks on television as an example of the tension at town halls that fall.^[39][40]

In February 2010, on the House floor, Moran called for the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the military policy of discharging soldiers on active duty who are openly homosexual. He spoke about a letter penned by a gay soldier who was then serving in the Afghanistan War, who had "learned that a fellow soldier was also gay, only after he was killed by an IED in Iraq. The partner of the deceased soldier wrote the unit to say how much the victim had loved the military; how they were the only family he had ever known... This immutable human trait, sexual orientation, like the color of one's skin, does not affect one’s integrity, their honor, our commitment to their country. Soldiers serving their country in combat should not have their sacrifices compounded by having to struggle with an antiquated Don’t ask, don’t tell policy. Let's do the right and honorable thing and repeal this policy."^[41][42]

As a member of the House Appropriations Committee, Moran has worked to allocate federal funding to projects in Northern Virginia, usually in the technology and defense industries. He also assisted in authorizing the replacement of the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge, a bridge between Alexandria, Virginia, and Prince George's County, Maryland, which had gained a reputation over the years among Northern Virginia residents as the site of numerous rush-hour traffic jams.^[4][43]

On March 9, 2010, Moran was named to succeed Norm Dicks of Washington as the chairman of the House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee. The chairmanship gave Moran authority over appropriations to the Department of the Interior, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the National Endowment for the Arts; among other things. Moran said he was excited to be able to play a role in protecting the environment and conserving natural resources.^[44][45]

2010s[link]

Moran became the ranking member of the subcommittee after the Democratic Party lost control of the House of Representatives following the November 2010 elections.

After President Obama's 2011 State of the Union Address, Moran was interviewed by Alhurra, an Arab television network. During the interview, he said, "a lot of people in [the United States of America]...don't want to be governed by an African-American" and that the Democrats lost seats in the 2010 election for "the same reason the Civil War happened in the United States...the Southern states, particularly the slaveholding states, didn't want to see a president who was opposed to slavery."^[46] The remarks received national media attention.^[47][48] The Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin said the remarks were "beyond uncivil" and "obnoxious".^[49]

Jim Moran attending the Rosslyn pit stop at Bike-to-Work Day DC 2012

On March 16, 2012, Moran was arrested outside the Sudanese embassy in Washington, DC at a protest against human rights abuses perpetrated by the Sudanese government, specifically bombings in the Nuba Mountains and refusal to allow humanitarian aid organizations access to refugees. He was charged with disorderly conduct and released, along with George Clooney and several others.^[50][51]

Moran occasionally makes appearances on MSNBC, usually on Hardball with Chris Matthews and The Ed Show.^[52][53]

Committee assignments[link]

• Committee on Appropriations
  • Subcommittee on Defense
  • Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies (Ranking Member)

Caucus memberships[link]

• LGBT Equality Caucus
• Congressional Progressive Caucus
• Congressional Bike Caucus
• New Democrat Coalition (co-founder)
• Sudan Caucus^{[citation needed]}
• Sportsmen's Caucus
• International Conservation Caucus
• Congressional Arts Caucus

Political positions[link]

Social issues[link]

Moran speaking at an event for Mayors Against Illegal Guns.

Moran has voted against the Defense of Marriage Act, the Federal Marriage Amendment, and he was in favor of repealing the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy.^[41] He also supports gun control, voting for the Brady Bill and supporting a reinstatement of the Assault Weapons Ban.^[37][54] At different times he has voted to ban flag-burning and partial-birth abortions, though he has reversed his positions on both issues. On education, he has expressed support for the public education system, universal pre-kindergarten, and full funding for the No Child Left Behind program.^[55] Moran has been given a 100% rating by the NARAL and 0% by the National Right to Life Committee, indicating a pro-choice voting record. He also voted to expand research of embryonic Stem Cells and to allow minors to go across state lines to receive abortions.^[54]

On immigration, Moran supports a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants and does not support decreasing the number of legal immigrants allowed into the country or the enforcement of federal immigration laws by state and local police.^[56] He was a cosponsor of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform ASAP Act of 2009 (H.R.4321), which the House did not pass.^[57] He has been given an overall immigration reduction grade of D by NumbersUSA.^[58] The American Immigration Lawyers Association has scored him as having voted 31 times for the organization's position and 7 times against the organization's position.^[59]

In September 2009, Moran was one of 75 members of the House of Representatives to vote no on a bill to eliminate any federal funds going to community organizer ACORN.^[60]

Environment[link]

Moran has listed the environment as one of his top issues, citing his high marks from the League of Conservation Voters and the Sierra Club. He has used his positions as a member of the Appropriations Committee and as chairman of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee to allocate federal funding for hiking trails^[61] and wildlife reserves in his district.^[62]

He has also voted to ban logging on federal lands. He has criticized the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for inaction on climate change, saying that "EPA had a historic opportunity to tackle head-on one of the greatest threats to our existence—global warming. Instead they balked under pressure from the administration, concluding the problem is so complex and controversial that it cannot be resolved." He has also endorsed and voted for the Clean Air Act and says that global warming is an important issue to him.^[54] In 2010, Moran also expressed discontent with President Barack Obama's decision to allow oil drilling off the coast of the United States.^[63][64]

Economy, budget, and taxes[link]

Moran often breaks with his party on economic issues. For example, he has supported Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and other free trade agreements,^[54] harsher bankruptcy laws, and increased restrictions on the right to bring class action suits.^[54]

He voted for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) Reform and Accountability Act. He supports pay-as-you-go budgeting and believes "that the American government needs to strive to build up a surplus when possible, so that there are funds to support and sustain our country during tough financial times." Moran has called former President George W. Bush "Fiscally irresponsible."^[54][65]

Moran has said he supports the redistribution of wealth, saying in November 2008 that "We have been guided by a Republican administration who believes in this simplistic notion that people who have wealth are entitled to keep it and they have an antipathy towards the means of redistributing wealth."^[66] He also says on his website that the recession was largely "a result of the imbalance in the distribution of wealth over the last eight years and an absence of oversight and accountability."^[54]

Social programs[link]

Moran has called Social Security "a safe, stable, and dependable source of financial assistance for retirees and their families," and strongly opposes privatizing Social Security, saying that it would "cripple the system". It is his position that any changes to the current system must "promote its long-term solvency without disrupting the core principles on which the program was founded."^[67]

Moran has expressed support for Universal Healthcare and more specifically the public health insurance option, saying at a town hall meeting in Reston, Virginia, in August 2009 that "It could do the most to bring down long-term medical costs and to adequately insure every American."^[68][69] Moran voted for the Affordable Health Care for America Act, which passed in November 2009, saying about the bill on his website that the "cost of doing nothing is simply too high for the American people to carry who today pay more than twice what people everywhere else on earth pay but yet live no longer nor healthier lives".^[70]

Defense[link]

Moran voted against authorizing the Iraq War in 2002 and did not support the troop increase for the Afghanistan War proposed by President Barack Obama in 2009, saying first that he appreciated Obama's "careful consideration regarding the U.S.'s engagement in Afghanistan", but later defining the issues on which he and the President disagreed:

"Our security concern is Al-Qaeda, not the Taliban. Eight years ago we went into Afghanistan to eliminate al-Qaeda and the “safe haven” that Afghanistan’s Taliban were providing the terrorist group responsible for the 9/11 attacks. Al-Qaeda has no significant presence today in all of Afghanistan.... Instead of increasing our troop presence, the U.S. should limit its mission in Afghanistan to securing strategic Afghan population centers with the troops currently on the ground."^[71]

Other[link]

Moran does not support granting statehood to the District of Columbia.^[72] However, he has voted to allow Washington, D.C., to send a voting representative to the United States Congress.^[73]

Moran is in favor of stronger prohibitions against animal fighting.

Controversies[link]

Reputed conflicts of interest[link]

MBNA loan[link]

Moran's support for harsher bankruptcy law provisions and sponsorship of stricter bankruptcy legislation brought allegations in 2002 that his support came in return for financial favors by financial institutions which could benefit from such laws. In January 1998, one month before he introduced the legislation, credit card bank MBNA advocated that it would restrict the ability of consumer debtors to declare bankruptcy. Moran received a favorable debt consolidation loan from the bank that allowed him to avoid personal bankruptcy arising from credit card and stock market losses. The $447,000 loan at a favorable interest rate was the largest loan to an individual MBNA issued in 1998. Its belated disclosure triggered a Federal Elections Commission investigation into whether or not it constituted an improper contribution.

The Lieutenant Governor of Virginia at the time, Tim Kaine, joined Republican lawmakers in calling for a House Ethics Committee investigation into the loan, saying that Moran had made "an error in judgment" by accepting it. In his own defense, Moran said that the timing of the legislation's introduction was coincidental and had nothing to do with the loan. MBNA spokesman Brian Dalphon said that the bank had offered the mortgage package not knowing that Moran was a member of Congress, and that the loan "made good business sense" because with the mortgage loan, "we improved our position by getting security for an unsecured loan.... He had credit cards with us, he was having financial difficulties; this put him in a better position to be able to pay us back from a cash-flow standpoint."^[74][75]

PMA group[link]

The House Ethics Committee investigated several members of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, including Moran, Peter J. Visclosky, Norm Dicks, Marcy Kaptur and the late John Murtha, who was the chairman at the time, for a conflict of interest in the allocation of the government contracts to clients of the PMA Group, which donated nearly a million dollars to Moran's political action committee, as well as a significant amount of money to the gubernatorial campaign of Moran's younger brother, Brian.^[76] Moran said that he was unaware of "who made donations", and "how much they gave", and therefore was not affected by the donations when allocating the funding.^[77]

In February 2010, the panel cleared Moran and the others, saying that they violated no laws. The panel concluded, as part of its 305 page report, that "simply because a member sponsors an earmark for an entity that also happens to be a campaign contributor... does not support a claim that a member's actions are being influenced by campaign contributions" .^[78] After PMA's founder, Paul Magliocchetti, plead guilty in September 2010 to six years of campaign finance fraud,^[79] Moran said that he would not return the $177,700 in PMA Group-related donations that he received from 1990 to 2010.^[80]

AIPAC and the Iraq War[link]

Comments prior to the Invasion of Iraq[link]

Prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Moran told an anti-war audience in Reston, Virginia, that if "it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this. The leaders of the Jewish community are influential enough that they could change the direction of where this is going, and I think they should". This brought criticism from many of his own party, including, among others, Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle and Senator Joe Lieberman. Nancy Pelosi, who was House Minority Leader at the time, remarked that "Moran's comments have no place in the Democratic Party."^[81]

Moran apologized for the remarks, saying that "I should not have singled out the Jewish community and regret giving any impression that its members are somehow responsible for the course of action being pursued by the administration, or are somehow behind an impending war... What I was trying to say is that if more organizations in this country, including religious groups, were more outspoken against war, then I do not think we would be pursuing war as an option."^[82][83]

Criticism of AIPAC[link]

Moran was criticized by Jewish groups again in 2007 for remarks made in an issue of Tikkun, a California-based Jewish magazine, which were said to have placed blame for the Iraq War on the pro-Israel American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. Moran told Tikkun that AIPAC is "[t]he most powerful lobby and has pushed this war from the beginning. I don't think they represent the mainstream of American Jewish thinking at all, but because they are so well organized, and their members are extraordinarily powerful – most of them are quite wealthy – they have been able to exert power."^[82][83]

Moran's remarks were criticized by the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington and the National Jewish Democratic Council. Ronald Halber, executive director of the first group, said that Moran "uses several age-old canards that have been used throughout history that have brought violence upon Jews... He uses clearly anti-Semitic images such as Jewish control of the media and wealthy Jews using their wealth to control policy." He was also criticized by many House Democrats, including Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and Energy and Commerce committee chairman Henry Waxman, who said that Moran's remarks were inaccurate and "deeply offensive". House Republican Whip, the sole Republican Jewish member of Congress, and fellow Representative from Virginia Eric Cantor said that Moran's remarks were "bigoted".^[84]

However, Rabbi Michael Lerner, the editor of Tikkun, defended Moran's position, writing in the September–October issue of his magazine that "It's the kind of statement I would have made to any religious community, or to any labor movement audience, citing their own failures to act as a critical factor in why we had gotten involved." Moran stood by his remarks in the interview, saying in a separate interview that the pro-Israel lobby had not represented mainstream U.S. Jewish opinion in recent years, most notably with its Middle East policies, which he characterized as directly aligned with those of the Bush administration.^[85] In a statement Moran further affirmed that it was not his position American Jews were responsible for the Iraq War, and that his remarks to the magazine were directed solely at AIPAC. It stated that Moran "recognizes the progressive nature of the Jewish community as a whole, and notes that if the rest of America voted the way Jews vote, the U.S. would not be in the war in Iraq today, and would have health care for all, and would not be involved in discriminatory treatment of gays or of immigrants."^[86]

"Taliban ticket"[link]

In 2009 Moran was speaking at a get out the vote rally for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds when he said "I mean, if the Republicans were running in Afghanistan, they'd be running on the Taliban ticket as far as I can see." Moran was referring to the Virginia Republican ticket of Bob McDonnell, Bill Bolling, and Ken Cuccinelli. A McDonnell spokesperson said the comment was "negative" and "vicious".^[87]

Reported assaults[link]

During his tenure as mayor of Alexandria (1985–1990), Moran was reportedly accused of assault, though no charges were ever filed. Alexandria police officers have refused to discuss Moran's tenure as Mayor publicly, but several officers said privately that his behavior would have led to the arrest of "ordinary citizens."^[88]

In April, 2000 parents of an 8-year-old boy filed a complaint against Moran for allegedly assaulting their son who was admiring Moran's car. "He choked me and then cussed at me," the boy told The Washington Times. "I thought he was going to kidnap or kill me...All I told him was that I liked his car."^[89]

Insider trading[link]

In November 2011, author Peter Schweizer published a book, Throw Them All Out, which included an allegation that Moran used information he got from a September 16, 2008 briefing, in which Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke warned of an impending financial crisis, for his stock market activity:

"September 17, 2008, was by far Moran’s most active trading day of the year. He dumped shares in Goldman Sachs, General Dynamics, Franklin Resources, Flowserve Corporation, Ecolabs, Edison International, Electronic Arts, DirecTV, Conoco, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Apple, CVS, Cisco, Chubb, and a dozen more companies."

Moran made more than 90 trades that day.^[90]

Electoral history[link]

Personal life[link]

Moran has been married three times. His second wife, Mary Howard Moran, filed for divorce in 1999, one day after an argument at the couple's Alexandria home which resulted in a visit by the police.^[94] The Congressman provided his own divorce papers a few months later, and in 2003 the couple officially separated.^[95] He remarried in 2004 to real estate developer LuAnn Bennett. In December 2010, Moran and Bennett announced they were separating.^[96]

Moran is the father of four children, including Mary Moran, who works at the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA),^[97] and Dorothy, who was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor during her father's campaign for reelection against Kyle McSlarrow in 1994. It was said at the time that she had only a twenty percent chance of living to age five, but after almost two years of chemotherapy and herbal therapies she was designated cancer free.^[13][98]

His brother, Brian Moran, is a former member of the Virginia House of Delegates, and currently the head of the Virginia Democratic Party. He was an unsuccessful primary candidate for Governor of Virginia in the 2009 election.^[99]

Moran, who was a stockbroker before running for public office, made more than 537 options trades, which had a potential value of more than $3 million, between 1995 and 2003, according to The Washington Post. In 1999 Moran lost approximately $120,000 from options investments. During divorce proceedings in 2003, the attorneys for his second wife described the trading as "stock market gambling" in court papers. Since his remarriage to LuAnn Bennett in 2004, Moran's disclosure statements have shown him to have one of the most actively traded portfolios in Congress. In May 2010, Moran's Chief of Staff, Austin Durrer, said that Moran had not personally made any trades for the past five years.^[100]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jim Moran

	Virginia portal
	Biography portal
	Politics portal

• Representative James Moran official U.S. House site
• Jim Moran for Congress official campaign site
• Biography at WhoRunsGov.com at The Washington Post
• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Voting record maintained by The Washington Post
• Biography, voting record, and interest group ratings at Project Vote Smart
• Congressional profile at GovTrack
• Congressional profile at OpenCongress
• Issue positions and quotes at On the Issues
• Financial information at OpenSecrets.org
• Staff salaries, trips and personal finance at LegiStorm.com
• Campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission
• Appearances on C-SPAN programs
• Collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Jim Moran as featured in the film Finding Our Voices

Carolyn Maloney
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York's 14th district
Incumbent
Assumed office January 3, 1993
Preceded by	S. William Green
Personal details
Born	Carolyn Jane Bosher (1946-02-19) February 19, 1946 (age 66) Greensboro, North Carolina, U.S.
Political party	Democratic
Spouse(s)	Clifton Maloney (1937–2009, his death)
Children	Christina Maloney Virginia Maloney
Residence	New York, New York, U.S.
Alma mater	Greensboro College
Occupation	United States Congresswoman
Religion	Presbyterian

Carolyn Jane Bosher Maloney^[1] (born February 19, 1946) is the U.S. Representative for New York's 14th congressional district, serving since 1993. She is a member of the Democratic Party. The district, popularly known as the "silk stocking district", includes most of Manhattan's East Side; Astoria and Long Island City in Queens; and Roosevelt Island.

Early life, education and career[link]

Carolyn Maloney was born in Greensboro, North Carolina, the daughter of Christine Elizabeth (née Clegg) and Ralph George Bosher.^[2] She graduated from Greensboro College. In 1970, she visited New York City and decided to stay.^[3] For several years, she worked as a teacher and an administrator for the New York City Board of Education.^[4] In 1977, she obtained a job working for the New York State Legislature and held senior staff positions in both the State Assembly and the State Senate.^[4]Maloney is the first woman to represent New York’s 14th Congressional District; the first woman to represent New York City’s 7th Council district (where she was the first woman to give birth while in office); and was the first woman to Chair the Joint Economic Committee, a House and Senate panel that examines and addresses the nation’s most pressing economic issues.^[5] Maloney is widely viewed as "a strong champion for women's rights, supporting reproductive rights, promoting economic justice for women and pursuing equality for all through such actions as reintroducing the Equal Rights Ammendment. ^[6] Nicholas Kristoff said of her work in the battle against human trafficking: "No one has been a greater champion than Carolyn Maloney" in the fight against human trafficking. ^[7] Her question: "Where are the women?" asked at a hearing by the Government Oversight Committee sparked a firestorm of controversy in the 2012 election cycle. ^[8]

New York City Council[link]

Maloney was elected to the New York City Council in 1982, defeating incumbent Robert Rodriguez ^[9] in a heavily Spanish-speaking district based in East Harlem and parts of the South Bronx. She served as a Councilmember for 10 years.^[10] On the Council, she served as the first Chair of the Committee on Contracts, investigating contracts issued by New York City in sludge and other areas. She authored legislation creating the City's Vendex program, which established computerized systems tracking information on City contracts and vendors doing business with the City.^[11] Maloney also introduced the first measure in New York to recognize domestic partnerships, including those of same-sex couples.^[12] She was the first person to give birth while serving as a City Councilmember, and the first to offer a comprehensive package of legislation to make day care more available and affordable.^[4][13]

U.S. House of Representatives[link]

Committee assignments[link]

• Committee on Financial Services
  • Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government-Sponsored Enterprises
  • Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit (Ranking Member)
  • Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology
• Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
  • Subcommittee on TARP, Financial Services and Bailouts of Public and Private Programs

Caucus memberships[link]

• House 9/11 Commission Caucus
• House Caucus on Women's Issues
• International Conservation Caucus
• Congressional Arts Caucus

Legal initiatives[link]

In 2011, a Daily News survey found that Rep. Maloney ranks first among New York's 28 representatives for activity with 36 proposed bills, resolutions and amendments. ^[14]

Politically, Maloney is ranked in the National Journal's annual ranking as the 114th most Progressive (or 314th most conservative) member of Congress, with more Progressive scores on foreign policy than on economic and social policy. Her score of 75.5 ranks her as modestly more Progressive than the New York Congressional delegation as a whole.^[15]

National Security and 9/11 issues: Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Maloney worked to ensure that the Bush administration maintained its commitment to New York's recovery and security efforts, prompting Wayne Barrett of the Village Voice to write that Maloney was "like a tiger in the House on every dollar due New York." ^[16]

After the 9/11 Commission published its findings, Maloney co-founded the bipartisan House 9/11 Commission Caucus ^[17] and helped write and secure the enactment into law of many of its recommendations to reform the nation's intelligence agencies ^[18][19] Congressional Quarterly wrote in its annual guide, 2006 Politics in America: "In the 108th Congress, Maloney reached out beyond her usual roles as a liberal gadfly and persistent Bush administration critic, helping win enactment of a sweeping bill to reorganize U.S. intelligence operations."^[20]

Following the Dubai Ports World controversy, Maloney helped secure the passage and enactment of her bill to reform the system for vetting foreign investments in the United States.^[21][22] Maloney has supported Scientology's "New York Rescue Workers Detoxification Project".^[23]

Good Government: After reports of corruption among military contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, Maloney later secured House passage of her bill to create a database to better monitor all federal contracts, the key provisions of which were later adopted into law as part of the defense budget.^[24][25]

Health Care Issues: Maloney has taken several actions on health care issues. Her measure to provide Medicare coverage for annual mammograms was included in the Fiscal Year 1998 federal budget.^[26]

Maloney also advocated for the cause of providing federal support for medical monitoring and health care for rescue and recovery workers who were at the Ground Zero site after the 9/11 attacks, many of whom later developed serious respiratory and other ailments.^[27] In 2010, after leading the fight for it for years, President Barack Obama signed into law the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act, which Maloney authored, that provides $4.3 billion in federal funds to provide 9/11 responders and survivors with treatment and compensation for their injuries.

In the 111th Congress, Maloney introduced "The Breastfeeding Promotion Act" to protect breastfeeding in the workplace under civil rights law and make it illegal for women to lose their jobs or otherwise be discriminated against for expressing milk during lunchtime or on breaks.^[28] Maloney has advocated for international women's health and family planning programs supported by the United Nations Population Fund.^[29]

A co-founder and Co-Chair of the Congressional Working Group on Parkinson's Disease,^[30] she serves on the boards of the Michael Stern Parkinson's Research Foundation^[31] and the Fisher Center for Alzheimer's Research Foundation,^[32] both in New York City.

Responding to the concerns of many parents, Maloney introduced the “Comprehensive Comparative Study of Vaccinated and Unvaccinated Populations Act of 2007” (H.R. 2832), legislation that would require the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to conduct a comprehensive comparative study of vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, which may resolve the heated controversy over the possible link between autism and vaccine components, including thimerosal and aluminum.^[33] The original bill did not pass, but Maloney re-introduced the legislation in 2008.

Financial and Economic Issues: In Congress, Maloney serves on the Committee on Financial Services, the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and the Joint Economic Committee, and was previously the Chair of the Democratic Task Force on Homeland Security. From January 2009 to January 2011, Maloney served as Chair of the Joint Economic Committee the first woman to do so.

Maloney first introduced the "Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights" or (the Credit CARD Act of 2009) while serving as Chair of the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit, in the 110th Congress. The measure drew praise from editorial boards and consumer advocates.^[34][35] It was passed as the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act by both houses of the 111th Congress, prompting Money magazine to dub Maloney the "best friend a credit card user ever had".^[36] President Barack Obama signed the Credit Card Bill of Rights into law in a Rose Garden ceremony at the White House attended by Maloney on May 22, 2009.^[37]

Days after voting against cancellation of a $1 billion, 10-year subsidy plan for U.S. sugar farmers within the 2007 U.S. Farm Bill, Maloney hosted a fundraising event that netted $9,500 in contributions from sugar growers and refiners, according to Federal Election Commission records. Maloney's election attorney, Andrew Tulloch, called the timing of the 31 July fundraiser a "pure coincidence". The bill passed the House by a 282-144 vote.^[38] The Sunlight Foundation pointed out that among the 435 members of the U.S. House of Representatives, Maloney has the ninth-highest amount of investment in oil stocks.^[39] Maloney received a perfect 100 rating from the Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund in 2007 ^[40] and a perfect 100 rating from Environment America in 2008 ^[41] and a perfect 100 from the the League of Conservation Voters in Feb. of 2008 ^[42]. And in 2008, Maloney introduced the Minerals Management Service Improvement Act (HR 7211), as a House companion to S. 3543, Integrity in Offshore Energy Resources Act. The legislation would impose dramatically tougher ethics rules for the Minerals Management Service, which was at the center of a major corruption scandal stemming from its employees' relationships with oil company representatives.^[43]

Women's, Children's and Family Issues: Maloney has been active on issues involving women, children and families since the beginning of her career.^[10] A former Co-Chair of the House Caucus on Women's Issues, she authored and helped secure the enactment into law of a measure to provide federal funding to clear the backlog of rape kits for which evidence had been collected, but never entered into law enforcement DNA databases. It was called "the most important anti-rape legislation ever considered by Congress" by the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network.^[44] Maloney's bill, included in the "Justice for All Act of 2005", was named in honor of Debbie Smith, a rape survivor; the effort to enact it was later the subject of a Lifetime Television movie, A Life Interrupted: The Debbie Smith Story.^[45] Maloney was played by Lynne Adams. Maloney also co-authored and helped secure passage of bipartisan legislation to curb the demand for sex trafficking.^[46]

She introduced the Child Care Affordability Act of 2007 to increase access to child care by providing tax credits ^[47] Maloney's amendment to a foreign aid bill succeeded in securing $60 million in funding for programs for Afghan women and girls and to help establish an Afghan commission on human rights.^[48] She is the chief House sponsor of the Equal Rights Amendment.^[49] In 2008 and again in 2009, Maloney authored, and secured House passage of, a bill to provide four weeks of paid parental leave to federal employees.^[50][51]

She has also authored and introduced the Family and Medical Leave Inclusion Act that would expand the 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act to include couples in domestic partnerships, civil unions, and same-sex marriages.^[52] Legislation to create a National Women's History Museum that was jointly introduced by Maloney and her colleague Eleanor Holmes Norton was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in October, 2009.^[53]

District Issues: In Congress, Maloney has helped secure funding for major mass transit projects, resulting in the commitment of billions of federal dollars for New York State.^[54] Early in her tenure, she joined with colleagues to secure $306.1 million in federal funds for the 63rd Street Connector, a $645 million project that significantly expanded transit capacity between Queens and Manhattan ^[55] Maloney has been hailed as a champion of the Second Avenue Subway,^[56] a project first conceived in the 1920s. In November 2007, the federal government signed a full funding grant agreement with New York State committing to providing $1.3 billion in federal funds for the subway's first phase on Manhattan's Upper East Side.^[57] Maloney has also advocated for the East Side Access project, which will bring Long Island Railroad (LIRR) trains directly to Grand Central Terminal and create a new LIRR stop in Sunnyside, Queens. In December 2006, the federal government signed a full funding grant agreement promising $2.63 billion to New York to complete East Side Access.^[58]

Maloney co-sponsored the 2009 reintroduction of the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act (H.R. 801, originally introduced as H.R. 6845 in 2008) as well as the Research Works Act (H.R. 3699) introduced in 2011. Both bills aim to reverse the NIH's Public Access Policy,^[59] which mandates open access to NIH-funded research.^[60] The Association of American Publishers-backed Research Works Act was criticized by some scientists. In a New York Times op-ed, Michael Eisen described how the bill would force the public to pay $15–$30 per paper to read the results of research they had already paid for as taxpayers.^[61] (Such results must now be published in Pubmed Central (PMC) after an embargo period of up to 12 months: this embargo period was imposed to minimize financial harm to publishers who were concerned that their readership would diminish if the results appeared concurrently in PMC, though authors of the paper are required to submit their papers to PMC as soon as their paper gets accepted for publication by a peer-review journal.) Some have suggested that Maloney supports the measure because she is the recipient of campaign contributions from Elsevier, the largest scholarly publishing company.^[61][62] On February 27, 2012, following a boycott of the organization, In a letter to constituents, Maloney noted that "it is important to be mindful of the impact of various industries on job creation and retention. New York State is home to more than 300 publishers that employ more than 12,000 New Yorkers, many of whom live in or around New York City in my district. New York City scientific publishers represent a significant subset of the total, and more than 20 are located in Manhattan, publishing thousands of scientific journals and employing thousands of New Yorkers." ^[63] Elsevier withdrew their support for the legislation.^[64][65]

In 2010, the Project On Government Oversight, a government watchdog group, presented Maloney with its Good Government Award for her contributions to government transparency and oversight, including her investigations into corruption and mismanagement in the Mineral Management Service and her support of a Federal Contractor Misconduct Database similar to POGO's.^[66]

Book and notable television appearance: In 2008, Rodale Press published Maloney's book on women's issues, Rumors of Our Progress Have Been Greatly Exaggerated: Why Women's Lives Aren't Getting Any Easier—and How We Can Make Real Progress for Ourselves and Our Daughters.^[67] In the book, Maloney argues that progress for women has stalled and offers recommendations for resuming their advance toward full equality.^[68]

Maloney appeared on The Colbert Report in the Better Know a District segment on July 29, 2008, speaking about women's issues.

Political campaigns[link]

In 1992, Maloney was elected to the House of Representatives, narrowly defeating 15-year incumbent Bill Green, a progressive Republican, to become the first woman to ever represent the district. The 14th and its predecessors had been one of the few districts in the city where Republicans usually did well; in fact, they held the seat for all but eight of the 56 years between 1937 and Maloney's victory. Although the district had been made significantly more Democratic in redistricting, Maloney's win is still considered an upset.

Following Maloney's win, Republicans continued to hold most of the State Senate, Assembly, and City Council seats on Manhattan's East Side for nearly another decade. Since 2002, the Democrats have dominated the area, and now hold all of the area's seats in the state legislature and City Council.^[69]

Maloney faced significant opposition from Republican City Councilman Charles Millard in 1994, the year of a Republican tidal wave in the midterm congressional elections. She defeated Millard handily, taking 64 percent of the vote.^[70] She hasn't faced credible opposition since, and has been reelected eight more times by an average of 77 percent of the vote.

In 2004, Maloney faced a potential Democratic primary challenge from Robert Jereski, a former Green Party political candidate and unsuccessful candidate for delegate to the 2004 Democratic National Convention on the slate of Dennis Kucinich. Jereski opposed the Iraq War while Maloney had initially voted for the resolution to authorize force; she later forcefully renounced the war, including most memorably at a town hall meeting in her district ^[71] with antiwar Congressman John Murtha. However, Jereski didn't qualify for the ballot because his petition was found to have invalid signatures, leaving him 4 short of the 1250 required.

In December 2008, Maloney hired a public relations firm to help bolster her efforts to be named by Governor David Paterson as Hillary Clinton's successor as a New York Senator. Maloney toured parts of the state, but was overshadowed by Caroline Kennedy's promotional tour for the same seat. Maloney interviewed with the governor for 55 minutes. Public opinion polls placed Maloney's support for the Senate seat in the single digits, trailing the front-runner, then-New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, although her bid was endorsed by the National Organization for Women Political Action Committee, the Feminist Majority Political Action Committee,^[72] New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof,^[73] and other columnists ^[74] and editorial boards.^[75]

On January 23, 2009, Paterson named Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand to the post.^[76] Many urged Maloney to run against Gillibrand in 2010.^[77][78]

Although she had been leading Gillibrand in both the Rasmussen^[79] and the Quinnipiac polls,^[80] Maloney ruled out a run for the U.S. Senate and instead retained her congressional seat.^[81]

In the Democratic Primary for Congress on September 14, 2010, Maloney defeated a well-funded opponent, Reshma Saujani, a 34-year-old Indian-American hedge fund lawyer, by a landslide, 62-percentage point margin, racking up more than 81% of the vote to Saujani's 19 percent.^[82] That night, Saujani said, "I'm definitely running again,",^[83] but three months later announced publicly that she would not challenge Maloney again.^[84]

Criticism[link]

On July 20, 2009, Maloney apologized after using the word "nigger" in repeating a critical comment made by a third party about Senator Kirsten Gillibrand.^[85] Maloney was quoted by the City Hall News:^[86]

I got a call from someone from Puerto Rico, [who] said Gillibrand went to Puerto Rico and came out for English-only (education). And he said, 'it was like saying nigger to a Puerto Rican'.

Personal life[link]

She married Clifton Maloney, an investment banker, in 1976. The couple had two daughters, Christina and Virginia. Her husband, the oldest American ever to summit an "eight-thousander",^[87] the world's fourteen mountains that surpass 8,000 meters in altitude, died on a climbing expedition on September 25, 2009 while descending from the world's sixth tallest peak, Cho Oyu in Tibet.^[88][89] Before retiring to his tent for some sleep, Mr. Maloney's last words were reportedly: 'I am the happiest man in the world. I just climbed a beautiful mountain."^[90]

Maloney is a member of The Junior League of the City of New York.

Awards[link]

In 2006, Maloney received the Edith I. Spivack Award from the New York County Lawyers' Association's Women's Rights Committee. In 2007, Maloney was the American Honoree of the Friends of the United Nations Population Fund ^[91] In 2012 Maloney received the Bella Award from the Bella Abzug Leadership Institute ^[92]

Maloney's current ratings by various interest groups include the following: NARAL Pro-Choice America gives her a 100 The ACLU givers her a 100 The Children's Defense Fund gives her a 100 The League of Conservation Voters gives her a 100 The American Public Health Association gives her a 100 The Gunowners of America give her an "F" ^[93]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Carolyn Bosher Maloney

• U.S. Representative Carolyn B. Maloney official U.S. House site
• Carolyn Maloney for Congress official campaign website
• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Voting record maintained by The Washington Post
• Biography, voting record, and interest group ratings at Project Vote Smart
• Congressional profile at GovTrack
• Issue positions and quotes at On the Issues
• Current Bills Sponsored at StateSurge.com
• Financial information at OpenSecrets.org
• Staff salaries, trips and personal finance at LegiStorm.com
• Campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission
• Appearances on C-SPAN programs
• Collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Stop Deceptive Advertising for Women's Services Act - Text of bill introduced by Maloney
• 504 Democratic Club — Carolyn B. Maloney's 2006 congressional screening questionnaire response
• 504 Democratic Club — Carolyn B. Maloney's 2008 congressional screening questionnaire response