Lisa Murkowski

Lisa Murkowski

Lisa Ann Murkowski (born May 22, 1957 in Ketchikan , Alaska Territory ) is an American politician ( Republican Party ) and since December 2002 US Senator for the state of Alaska .

education and profession

Lisa Murkowski attended the public schools in Fairbanks and then from 1975 to 1977 first at Willamette University in Salem . She graduated from Georgetown University with a BA in Economics in 1980 and received a JD from Willamette University's College of Law five years later . Subsequently she was inducted into the Alaska Bar Association and practiced as a lawyer in Anchorage from 1987 to 1996 .

Political career

Murkowski gained his first political experience between 1990 and 1991 as a member of a working group set up by the mayor of Anchorage to deal with the problem of homelessness . From 1997 to 1998 she was a member of the Equal Opportunities Commission in this city. She was elected to the Alaska House of Representatives in 1998, but gave up that mandate when her father, newly elected Governor Frank Murkowski , named her as his successor in the United States Senate, of which she has been a member since December 20, 2002. In 2004, she won the regular election for the Senate seat by three percentage points over former Governor Tony Knowles of the Democratic Party . In the Senate, she sits on the Foreign Policy Committee . In her party, she is - especially in view of the recent successes of significantly more conservative members - as a representative of the moderate wing; Among other things, she has a pro-choice position with regard to abortion .

Before the Senate election in 2010 they defeated in the party's internal code ( Primary ) narrowly by the tea party movement and the former Governor Sarah Palin supported lawyer Joe Miller . However, she announced that she would run as a write-in candidate against him and Democratic candidate Scott McAdams in the November main election. This meant that although her name was not on the ballot paper, it could be entered by the voters themselves. After counting the ballots, she was seven percentage points ahead of Miller in the 2010 election. She was the first write-in candidate since 1954 to be elected to the Senate. Joe Miller had requested that the write-in votes be recounted to check whether write-ins in which the name "Lisa Murkowski" was not spelled correctly can also be counted. This motion was dismissed by the Alaska Supreme Court on December 10, 2010 in a 4-0 decision. Miller filed a lawsuit against this in the Alaska Federal District Court ; however, the appeal was dismissed on December 28, 2010. On December 30, Murkowski was officially declared the winner by Governor Sean Parnell , whereupon she took on another term in the Senate on January 3, 2011. There she still belonged to the Republican faction. Since she was confirmed in the 2016 election, her current mandate extends until January 3, 2023.

Positions

Murkowski is considered a moderate Republican, especially when it comes to women's rights.

In March 2015, she was one of the seven Republican US Senators who did not sign an open letter from the remaining 47 Republicans on this body on the Iranian nuclear program . In it, the signatories criticized the outcome of the international negotiations, refused to support President Obama and announced to the leaders of Iran that they would not be bound by the agreement.

Murkowski and her Republican colleague Susan Collins agreed on 7 February 2017 Senate against the education minister in the Cabinet Trump nominated Betsy DeVos . This resulted in a 50-50 stalemate that was overturned by the vote of Vice President Mike Pence . It was the first time in United States history that a cabinet member was elected to office by the vote of the vice president. Murkowski and Collins justified their vote with the fact that DeVos had too one-sided attitude towards the education system and preferred private schools to public ones.

Murkowski's vote in favor of the healthcare reform planned by the Republican majority in Congress to abolish Obamacare was long in the first half of 2017. Their decision on July 19, 2017 - together with Shelley Moore Capito and Susan Collins - to reject the immediately contemplated abolition of Obamacare without a simultaneous resolution of a counter-concept - let the plan of a health reform carried out by the Republicans alone fail for the time being.

Before President Trump's proposed Conservative Supreme Court candidate Brett Kavanaugh was confirmed, Murkowski was long a tie with two Democratic senators ( Heidi Heitkamp and Joe Manchin ) and two Republicans ( Jeff Flake and Susan Collins). Unlike Flake, Collins and Manchin, she voted against concluding the deliberation on October 5 and thus allowing the vote on Kavanaugh for the following day. The following day she voted against all the other Republican senators, not in favor of the confirmation of Kavanaugh, but in attendance in order to maintain the vote despite the prevention of another Republican. Kavanaugh was confirmed by 50 votes to 48.

Web links

Commons : Lisa Murkowski  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Lisa Murkowski in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)
• Senate website (English)
• Murkowski, Lisa. In: Our Campaigns (English)

supporting documents

1. ↑ Ultra-conservative triumphs in US primary. In: Spiegel Online , September 17, 2010.
2. ↑ Kim Murphy: Murkowski to run as write-in candidate; state GOP condemns move. In: The Los Angeles Times , September 18, 2010.
3. ↑ Hendrik Ternieden: Palin's arch-rival creates the sensation. In: Spiegel Online , November 3, 2010.
4. ↑ Alaska Senate Race: Is Miller Down for the Count? ( Memento of November 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) In: Fox News , November 4, 2010.
5. ^ Murkowski Certified as Official Winner of Alaska Senate Race. In: Fox News , December 30, 2010.
6. ^ Republican Senators Warn Iran in Open Letter. In: Politico , September 3, 2015 (English).
7. ↑ Betsy DeVos can only do it with the help of Mike Pence. In: Spiegel Online , February 7, 2017.
8. ↑ Thomas Kaplan: 'Plan C' on Obamacare, Repeal Now and Replace Later, Has Collapsed. In: The New York Times , July 19, 2017.
9. ^ Li Zhou: Here's where the 5 crucial swing senators stand on Kavanaugh. In: Vox.com , October 5, 2018.
10. ↑ Sheryl Gay Stolberg: Senate Confirms Kavanaugh to Supreme Court, Ending a Clash With Lasting Fallout. In: The New York Times , October 6, 2018.