Dan Coats

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Dan Coats (2017)

Daniel Ray "Dan" Coats (born May 16, 1943 in Jackson , Michigan ) is an American diplomat and politician of the Republican Party . The lawyer was US ambassador to Germany from 2001 to 2005 . From 1989 to 1999 and 2011 to 2017 he represented the state of Indiana in the US Senate . From March 2017 to August 2019, he was the director of national intelligence under President Donald Trump .

Education, work and family

After attending school in Jackson and studying at the evangelical Wheaton College in Illinois , which Billy Graham also attended, he served in the US Army from 1966 to 1968 . In 1971 he graduated from the Indiana University in Indianapolis the Juris Doctor . He was inducted into the bar in 1972 and worked for a life insurance company in Fort Wayne .

Dan Coats has been married to Marsha Coats since 1965 and has three grown children with her. Together with her he founded the 1990 Stiftung Foundation for American Renewal .

Political career

Member of the House of Representatives and Senate (1980 to 2005)

Dan Coats 1981

From 1977 to 1980 he was electoral district director for Indiana Congressman Dan Quayle , who later became US Vice President under George HW Bush . Coats moved in 1980 as a Republican in the US House of Representatives for the fourth constituency of Indiana, previously represented by Dan Quayle. He was re-elected four times. On January 3, 1989, Coats was appointed by Governor Robert D. Orr for the seat in the US Senate of Quayle, who had just been elected US Vice President, and was elected in an extraordinary by-election against the Democrat Baron Hill in 1990 for the remaining term of two Confirmed for years. In the regular Senate election in 1992 , he was elected for a full six-year term. As a senator, he was a member of the influential committee on the armed forces and chairman of the sub-committees on military personnel and on air and ground forces. In August 1998 he made headlines when he put the air strikes against targets in Afghanistan and Sudan ordered by US President Bill Clinton in the context of the Lewinsky affair . In 1998 he did not stand for re-election and therefore resigned from the US Senate in early 1999. In 1999, Coats joined a well-known Washington law firm as a special advisor , which also includes well-known former Senate majority leaders Bob Dole and George J. Mitchell . Coats was a possible candidate for Minister of Defense in 2001. George W. Bush appointed Donald Rumsfeld for reasons within the party .

Ambassador to Germany (2001 to 2005)

From August 15, 2001 to February 28, 2005, Dan Coats was ambassador to Germany . The beginning of his term of office was overshadowed by the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the USA. At this point in time Coats had not yet handed over his credentials to the German head of state and thus had not yet formally taken up his office and the possibilities of action associated with it. At the suggestion of Federal President Johannes Rau, Coats handed over the letter on September 12, 2001, waiving the usual reception, in order to immediately establish the full diplomatic capacity of the USA in Germany.

As ambassador, Coats repeatedly criticized the German government's policy for its position on the Iraq war . During his term of office, the surveillance of Angela Merkel's party cell phone , which was spied on from the US embassy in Berlin from 2002 to 2013, also began.

On 6 October 2004 Coats took with German Interior Minister Otto Schily and the Governing Mayor Klaus Wowereit the groundbreaking ceremony for the new US Embassy in Berlin before. Thanks to the support of the Coats couple, the grounds of the new building on Pariser Platz , a few meters from the Brandenburg Gate , were used in 2002 and 2003 for the first United Buddy Bears exhibitions , which then went on a world tour.

He was succeeded by William Timken , who took office on September 2, 2005.

Return to the Senate (2011 to 2017)

In February 2010, Coats announced that he was moving to Indiana to run for his former Senate seat. On this, the Democrat Evan Bayh was elected after him , who refused to run again. In the inner-party primary , Coats prevailed against Marlin Stutzman, who was supported by the Tea Party movement , and former congressman John Hostettler . In the Senate election on November 2, 2010 , Coats won with 54.6 percent of the vote against Democratic Congressman Brad Ellsworth , who got 40 percent. Thus, Coats moved back to the US Senate on January 3, 2011.

When, in March 2015, 47 of the 54 Republican US Senators undermined Obama's conduct of negotiations to control Iran's nuclear program in a public letter , he was among the seven members of his party who did not sign the letter.

In March 2015, Coats announced that he would not apply again in the 2016 Senate election but would retire from politics afterwards. In his last term in the Senate, Coats gained a non-partisan reputation for his cautious practical work, especially in security policy. His mandate ended on January 3, 2017.

Intelligence Director (2017-2019)

Sworn in as intelligence director by Vice President Mike Pence (video, 8:53 min.)

On Jan. 7, 2017 announced Donald Trump as president-elect of the United States to, Coats as director of national intelligence to nominate. Above all, his stance critical of Russia compared to Trump was discussed in this context. After he was ratified by the U.S. Senate on March 15, 2017, Coats took office the next day.

According to the Washington Post on May 22, 2017, Coats declined to publicly state that there was no evidence of Trump's suspected collusion with Russian authorities in the 2016 election campaign , as the president urged him to do in March. After Coats had worked in the background for a long time, he received public attention as the voice of the US intelligence services in connection with the summit meeting in Helsinki between Trump and Russia's President Vladimir Putin . Shortly before the meeting, Coats said there was clear evidence that Russia continued to launch cyberattacks to undermine democracy in the United States after influencing the 2016 election campaign in the United States . Immediately after the joint press conference with Putin, at which Trump said (and later denied) that he knew his intelligence services' assessment, but saw no reason why Russia should have intervened in the US election campaign, Coats defended the work of the services in one Explanation. When Coats found out at an event that Trump had invited Putin to the White House for autumn 2018 , he responded with obvious derision: "Okaay ... this will be special" ("Okaay ... that's going to be special").

Coats and Trump publicly contradicted each other on other issues as well. In his January 2019 report on the general security situation, Coats stated that Iran was not working on a nuclear weapon, while North Korea was not abandoning one. In both cases, Coats' assessments were in line with the policies of previous US administrations from which Trump had deviated. After his phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyi , President Trump stated in a tweet on July 28, 2019 that Coats was stepping down from his post on August 15, 2019. Trump appointed Joseph Maguire as his acting successor on August 8, 2019 . Coats resigned from office on August 15, 2019.

Political positions

In terms of fiscal policy , Coats advocated austerity ; his simultaneous commitment to higher arms spending, which was unproblematic in the 1980s, was increasingly perceived as contradicting itself in the 2010s. Coats had good relations with his home state and with many branches of his party, including the Tea Party . He took mostly conservative positions on socio-political issues, but deviated more often from the party line on individual issues. For example, he campaigned against the right to abortion ( Pro-Life ) and in 1992 supported the Family and Medical Leave Act , which gives young parents more time with their children, which business associations and conservative activists criticized. He was considered one of his allies for "compassionate conservatism" during the presidency of George W. Bush .

On gun control issues, Coats voted several times in the 1990s for tighter restrictions on gun access , leading to a mixed C rating by the National Rifle Association (NRA). In 2013, however, Coats voted against the Manchin-Toomey Bill , which would have introduced background checks on weapons purchases, citing voters' expectations. Coats opposed recognition of same-sex marriage and in 1993 opposed admitting homosexuals to the US military. In 1993 he helped draft the Don't ask, don't tell directive and refused to abolish it in 2011.

Coats has emerged as an expert in foreign and security policy since his second term in office and stands for an interventionist line. In 2010 he opposed the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and Iraq.

Web links

Commons : Dan Coats  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ron Elving: With Sen. Dan Coats' Retirement, One More Gone From The Old School. In: National Public Radio , March 25, 2015.
  2. ↑ Michael Tackett: Indiana Hopeful Takes Race In Stride. In: The Chicago Tribune , August 19, 1990.
  3. ↑ Dallas L. Dendy (editor): Statistics of the Congressional Election of November 6, 1990. US Government Printing Office, Washington DC 1991, in: Clerk.House.gov (PDF) , p. 12.
  4. ↑ Most Lawmakers Support Clinton's Military Strikes. In: CNN.com , Aug. 20, 1998.
  5. ↑ Michael S. Cullen : The first groundbreaking after 207 years. In: Der Tagesspiegel , October 5, 2004.
  6. ^ Eva and Klaus Herlitz (eds.): United Buddy Bears - The Art of Tolerance. English translation: Angelika Welt. Buddy Bear, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-00-029417-4 , pp. 12-15.
  7. ^ Carl Hulse: Ex-Senator Coats, Seeking a Return, Wins GOP Primary in Indiana. In: The New York Times , May 4, 2010.
  8. ^ Election 2010: Indiana. In: The New York Times , November 2010.
  9. ^ Republican Senators Warn Iran in Open Letter. In: Politico. March 9, 2015.
  10. ↑ Matthew Tully: US Sen. Dan Coats Will Not Seek Reelection. In: The Indianapolis Star , March 24, 2015.
  11. ^ Trump nominates Coats as director of intelligence. In: Die Zeit , January 7, 2017.
  12. ↑ Sasan Abdi-Herrle: USA: Dan Coats sees it differently. In: The time . January 7, 2017.
  13. ↑ Coats sworn in as US secret service director. In: Handelsblatt , March 16, 2017.
  14. ↑ Adam Entous, Ellen Nakashima: Trump asked intelligence chiefs to push back against FBI collusion probe after Comey revealed its existence. In: The Washington Post , May 22, 2017.
  15. ^ A b Julian E. Barnes: Dan Coats, the Intelligence Chief, Finds His Voice. Does It Anger Trump? In: The New York Times , July 17, 2018.
  16. ↑ Shane Harris, Felicia Sonmez, John Wagner: 'That's going to be special': Tensions rise as Trump invites Putin to Washington. In: The Washington Post , July 19, 2018.
  17. ↑ Kaitlan Collins, Pamela Brown, Nicole Gaouette, Zachary Cohen, Alex Marquart: Dan Coats to step down, Trump tweets, as President announces Ratcliffe will be nominated as next director of national intelligence. In: CNN.com , July 28, 2019.
  18. ↑ Trump appoints new secret service director. In: FAZ.net , August 9, 2019.
  19. ^ Tim Macy: Dan Coats, Gun Control and the Indiana Senate Primary. In: Gun Owners of America , February 11, 2010.
  20. ^ Aaron Blake: Where the Senate Stands on Guns - in One Chart. In: The Washington Post , December 17, 2012.
  21. ↑ Jack Colwell: Coats Defends his Vote on Guns. ( April 20, 2015 memento on the Internet Archive ) In: South Bend Tribune , May 20, 2013, made available on Coats' website.
  22. ↑ Eric Schmitt: Compromise on Military Gay Ban Gaining Support Among Senators. In: The New York Times , May 12, 1993.
  23. ^ A b Evie Salomon: Indiana US Senate Candidates Discuss Hot Topics of This Year's Election. In: Indiana Daily Student , Oct. 8, 2010.
predecessor Office successor
John Kornblum US Ambassador to Germany
August 15, 2001 to February 28, 2005 		John A. Cloud (Acting)
William Timken
personal data
SURNAME Coats, Dan
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Coats, Daniel Ray (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American politician and diplomat
DATE OF BIRTH May 16, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH Jackson , Michigan