Arlen specter where is he now

He infuriated liberals during the Thomas confirmation hearings with prosecutorial questioning of Anita Hill, a law professor who had accused Thomas of sexual harassment. Specter unsuccessfully sought the Republican presidential nomination. Specter was reviled by some conservatives for giving Obama an important early political victory. In April , Specter at age 79 abandoned the Republicans - saying his party had moved too far to the right - and was welcomed by Obama and Vice President Joe Biden as a Democrat.

But liberal challenger Joe Sestak, a retired Navy admiral and two-term congressman, painted Specter as a political contortionist concerned only about himself. Specter was born in Kansas in during the Great Depression.

His father was a Russian Jewish immigrant who owned a junkyard. Specter moved to Philadelphia at age 17 to attend the University of Pennsylvania. In , Specter was elected district attorney of Philadelphia, where he served two terms until his defeat in After failed bids for congress and the Pennsylvania governor's office, he eventually was elected to the Senate in In his three decades -- five terms -- in the Senate, Specter was a formidable presence on Capitol Hill, chairing three committees during his Senate career: the Intelligence, Judiciary, and Veterans Affairs committees.

Specter participated in 14 Supreme Court confirmation hearings and took leadership roles on legislation including the Armed Career Criminal Act, the Terrorist Prosecution Act, the Hate Crimes Act and legislation to expand Veteran's Rights, legislation to reform asbestos litigation, legislation for education and worker safety and the bill that created the Inspector General of the CIA. In , Time magazine honored him as one of "America's 10 Best Senators," pointing to his legislative achievements and the help he provided in securing expanded funding for the National Institutes of Health.

A career moderate, as a Republican Specter had a long record of bucking his party even while in leadership positions. He was a sharp critic of President Bill Clinton's healthcare proposals and sought the GOP presidential nomination to run against him in But two years later he would go on to vote "not proven" during Clinton's impeachment hearings, believing the president had not received due process.

As Judiciary Committee chair in , he called then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez to testify on the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping of U. During the scandal the same year around the leaking of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity, Specter said President Bush, "owes a specific explanation to the American people," over the circumstances, adding that even if "the president may be entirely in the clear, and it may turn out that he had the authority to make the disclosures which were made, it was not the right way to go about it because we ought not to have leaks in government.

Besides his time spent on Capitol Hill, Specter may be best known for his party switch, which played a key role in helping President Obama get his flagship legislation though Congress. Specter called his decision to switch from Republican to Democrat "painful," and said he made the decision based on public and private polling in Pennsylvania that showed "the prospects for winning a Republican primary [in Pennsylvania] are bleak. Senate Republican leaders admitted they were unhappy losing a member, but argued that it had nothing to do with the national Republican Party rejecting moderates, but only with local Pennsylvania politics and Specter's desire for "political self-preservation.

In , Specter lost the Democratic primary to then-U. Joe Sestak, who in turn lost the race to Republican Pat Toomey. Specter supported the Obama administration's controversial American Recovery and Reinvestment Act -- the stimulus -- and Wall Street reform as efforts to get the economy back on track after the collapse of Meehan, who lusted for the chance to win a major office in a Democratic city.

Specter remained a Democrat throughout the campaign, switching to Republican after he had won. That brought charges of political expediency - the same allegation he would face 35 years later when he switched back to being a Democrat.

He had hardly started as D. But he had kept his job as district attorney, and so remained a force in the city. He was reelected to a second term in , and still seemed on track for higher office. Then the bottom fell out. Running for a third term, he lost to Democrat F. Emmett Fitzpatrick. Running for the U. Senate in '76, he lost in the Republican primary. Running for governor in '78, he again lost in the primary. Charles Robbins, who coauthored two of the memoirs, said Specter was never good at self-reflection.

He could remember vote counts and the fine points of legislation for decades. But discussing his feelings was another matter. Robbins recalled that when the pair were working on Specter's final memoir, "what he would give me was what he thought. He'd say, 'I know I'm not giving you what you want. What you want is how I feel. This is really the best I can do. The three straight defeats in the s might have caused another man to quit politics.

But they seemed only to drive Specter harder. When the next plum job came up - a Senate seat in - he jumped right back in. His previous campaigns, however unsuccessful, had made him widely known across Pennsylvania. He also outworked him, traveling to all 67 counties. Often described as the world's greatest deliberative body, the Senate was an ideal realm for the former debate champ from Russell High. He loved the thrust and parry, the arcane rules, the chance to stamp matters of national importance.

He traveled the world as a sort of independent ambassador. When an issue interested him, all he had to do was hold a hearing and the witnesses would come. If he had an announcement, the press would be there. On his weekly trips from Philadelphia to Washington, where he had a Georgetown condo, his staffers would take him to 30th Street Station and pick him up at Union Station.

He enjoyed rubdowns in the Senate gym. As a regular Amtrak rider, he helped preserve federal funding for passenger rail service. He helped Rendell's wife, Marjorie, become a judge of the U. District Court in Philadelphia and, later, an appellate court judge.

A legendary hard worker, he demanded the same from his staff. More than once he made published lists of tough bosses in Washington. The last thing you want to do for a parent is disappoint. It was like that with him. A sports fan, he leavened his image with frequent appearances on WIP radio in which he bantered about the Eagles with morning host Angelo Cataldi.

He also was sometimes a guest of Howard Stern on national radio. It was on the Senate Judiciary Committee that Specter made the biggest impact - and generated the most controversy. That committee oversees the confirmation process for federal judicial nominees, including Supreme Court nominees. In , President Reagan nominated Bork, a brilliant, hard-core conservative, for the Supreme Court. The entire Democratic coalition, including groups representing minorities, women and unions, massed against Bork.

Conservatives, including the Rev. Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority, got behind him. With its civil-rights and abortion-battle overtones, the fight fanned the culture wars, and Specter was in the middle of it as Bork's lead interrogator. Arthur Makadon, a Philadelphia lawyer and Specter confidante, remembers: "Bork was smart but not as penetratingly smart as Arlen. Arlen beat Bork on Bork's turf.

No one else in the Senate could have done that.. Arlen undressed him in public view. That was Arlen at his best. When Spdecter finally announced he would vote against Bork, it helped tip the balance, and Bork was rejected, Conservatives would never forgot who had slipped in the knife. As the Almanac of American Politics noted in its edition, Specter's independence often earned respect, but not friends.

What liberals long held against him took place in Specter was assigned to question law professor Hill in the divisive confirmation hearing for Thomas, another Republican Supreme Court nominee. Specter doubted that Hill was telling the truth in accusing Thomas of lewd sexual harassment during an earlier period.

The tone of his questions - maybe it was just Specter being Specter - was cold, accusatory, prosecutorial. A well-dressed woman in the hallway sneered at him, "God should strike you dead.

By the time he got back to his office, new phone lines had to be installed and 40 staffers imported to handle the nasty calls. Liberals were already angry even before he voted to confirm Thomas. Conservatives, still upset over the Bork hearings, supported an antiabortion candidate in the Republican primary. Specter brushed aside the challenge, but the unexpected survivor of a five-candidate Democratic primary turned out to have perfect credentials in what became known as "the year of the woman.

Yeakel ran a TV ad that showed Hill being grilled by Specter and asked, "Did this make you as angry as it made me? The incumbent's instinct was to strike back.