Don Young

Don Young (2017)

Donald Edwin "Don" Young (* 9 June 1933 in Meridian , Sutter County , California ) is an American politician of the Republican Party . Since 1973 he has been the sole representative of the state of Alaska in the United States House of Representatives .

Family, education and work

Don Young grew up on his family ranch in California . He attended high school in Sutter from 1947 to 1951 and then the Yuba Junior College , which he left in 1952 with an associate degree . He then served from 1955 to 1957 as a private in the United States Army and studied at California State University in Chico , which he graduated in 1958 with a bachelor's degree in education. In 1959 he moved to Alaska, first to Anchorage and 1960 to Fort Yukon , a small town north of the Arctic Circle . He worked on several construction projects and as a commercial fisherman and hired himself as a construction worker, trapper , helmsman of a tugboat and prospector and taught from 1960 to 1967 in a primary school of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Fort Yukon.

Young has been married to Anne Garland Walton since June 2015. Young has two children from his marriage to his late wife Lula Fredson. He is a member of the Episcopal Church and lives in Fort Yukon.

Political career

Beginnings at the local and regional level

From 1960 to 1968 Young was a member of the Fort Yukon City Council and from 1964 to 1968 mayor of this small town north of the Arctic Circle . Between 1966 and 1970 he was a member of the Alaska House of Representatives ; from 1970 to 1973, when he stepped down, he was a member of the Alaska Senate .

United States House of Representatives

Don Young 1973

Young was the Republican candidate in the 1972 election against Democrat Nick Begich, Alaska's only seat in the United States' House of Representatives . Begich disappeared without a trace on a flight three weeks before the election and nevertheless won the election in November 1972 as a missing person with 56.2 to 43.8 percent of the vote. After Begich was pronounced dead, a by-election was scheduled for his seat, with Young again running. In March 1973 he narrowly prevailed against the Democrat Emil Notti and became a member of the House of Representatives on March 6, 1973. Since then, Young has won 22 re-elections with votes ranging from 46.78% (1992 against John S. Devens ) to 74.66% (2002 against Clifford Mark Greene ). In 2008, he scored 50.14 percent against Ethan Berkowitz , his third worst result to date (including the lost 1972 election) after winning the Republican primary by just 234 votes against Alaska's Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell, who supported Governor Sarah Palin . By the end of 2016, Young had introduced and enforced 79 laws in his congressional career. Since the resignation of Rep. John Conyers on December 5, 2017, Young has been the longest-serving current Congressman.

In the 2018 election , according to polls, Young was only slightly ahead of his Democratic challenger Alyse Galvin , so observers expected an open vote and slight advantages for Young. Young finally won with 54.2 to 45.8 percent of the vote and is currently a member of the 116th Congress of the United States .

Positions, controversies and awards

Young agrees with the party line on most questions, and on the question of abortion he is reliably pro-life . In contrast, he campaigned for the controversial stem cell research, which his opponent Parnell led against him in the 2008 area code. Young serves on the board of directors of the National Rifle Association , the largest lobbying association for gun manufacturers in the United States. He believes restrictions to promote environmental protection are a hindrance and advocates opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil production. However, he has voted several times for laws for climate protection.

Young was repeatedly suspected of having been bribed , which is why he and his long-time congressional colleague, Senator Ted Stevens , were investigated for grants from the oil industry from 2007 onwards . In 2007, the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington made him one of the 22 most corrupt congressmen. Former FBI chief Robert Mueller described Young as a crook, according to Bob Woodward's book Fear: Trump in the White House . However, no misconduct was ever discovered and the investigation was closed in 2010.

Young is known for his direct, impulsive manner that includes swearing and yelling at fellow members of Congress; Young sees this as an advantage to represent the interests of Alaska effectively. Young often takes controversial positions. He said he wanted to bite a congressional colleague “like a mink” because he rejected his subsidy proposals, and he called the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico a “natural phenomenon” rather than a man-made ecological catastrophe. In 2013, he referred to Hispanics - some of whom had worked as migrant workers on his father's ranch - as wetbacks . The Speaker of the House , John Boehner , to outraged. In February 2018, Young said that the Jews could have prevented the Holocaust if they had been adequately armed.

The United States Chamber of Commerce awarded Young the Spirit of Enterprise award , and the Americans for Tax Reform gave him the Hero of the Taxpayers award .

literature

• Don Young, Republican. In: State of Alaska (Ed.): Official Election Pamphlet. Office of the Governor, Division of Elections, Juneau, November 4, 1986, p. 31 (PDF) .

Web links

Commons : Don Young  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Wikiquote: Don Young  - Quotes

• Web presence at the Congress (English)
• Don Young in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)
• Young, Don. In: Our Campaigns (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Liz Ruskin: Rep. Don Young Marries on 82nd Birthday. In: Alaska Republic , June 9, 2015.
2. ↑ Mark Thiessen: Rep. Don Young wins 23rd term in Congress. In: Juneau Empire , November 9, 2016; Hannah Northey: Don Young on climate, his temper and his favorite Democrats. In: EENews , January 23, 2018; Donald Young's Biography. In: Vote Smart ; Don Young, Republican. In: State of Alaska (Ed.): Official Election Pamphlet. Office of the Governor, Division of Elections, Juneau, November 4, 1986, p. 31 (PDF) .
3. ↑ General Election 1972: AK At-Large. In: Our Campaigns.
4. ↑ Mark Thiessen: Rep. Don Young wins 23rd term in Congress. In: Juneau Empire , November 9, 2016.
5. ↑ Jessica Estepa: Alaska's Don Young to become most senior member of Congress after Conyers' retirement. In: USA Today , December 5, 2017.
6. ↑ Liz Ruskin: Poll shows challenger closing in on Rep. Young. In: Alaska Public Media , October 9, 2018; Taegan Goddard: Don Young Trails In Alaska. In: Political Wire , November 2, 2018; Alex Isenstadt: GOP super PAC rushes to save Alaska's Don Young from defeat. In: Politico , November 3, 2018. See aggregated polls Alaska At-Large District - Young vs. Galvin. In: RealClearPolitics ; 2018 Midterm Election Forecast: Alaska at large. In: FiveThirtyEight .
7. ^ Alaska Election Results: At-Large House District. In: The New York Times , November 7, 2018.
8. ↑ Eric E. Bouhassira: The SAGE Encyclopedia of Stem Cell Research. SAGE, 2015, p. 177 (e-book) .
9. ^ Dave Gilson: Meet the NRA's Board of Directors. In: Mother Jones , January 16, 2013.
10. ↑ Mark Thiessen: Rep. Don Young wins 23rd term in Congress. In: Juneau Empire , November 9, 2016.
11. ↑ https://climateandsecurity.org/2018/08/13/us-congress-addresses-climate-change-and-security-in-the-latest-defense-bill/
12. ^ Clive S. Thomas: Alaska. In: Donald P. Haider-Merkel: Political Encyclopedia of US States and Regions. Pp. 353-364, here p. 355 ; Dermot Cole: Mueller called Don Young 'crook,' according to Bob Woodward's Trump book. In: Reporting from Alaska , September 28, 2018.
13. ^ Hannah Northey: Don Young on climate, his temper and his favorite Democrats. In: EENews , January 23, 2018.
14. ↑ House of Representatives: Republicans insult Hispanics as "wet back". In: Welt Online , March 30, 2013; Eli Rosenberg: A brief history of Rep. Don Young's incendiary remarks. (All right, it's a long history.). In: The Washington Post , February 28, 2018.
15. ↑ Donald Young's Biography. In: Vote Smart.