Harold Ford | |
|---|---|
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| Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromTennessee's9th district | |
| In office January 3, 1997 – January 3, 2007 | |
| Preceded by | Harold Ford Sr. |
| Succeeded by | Steve Cohen |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Harold Eugene Ford Jr. (1970-05-11)May 11, 1970 (age 55) Memphis, Tennessee, U.S. |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 2 |
| Parent | Harold Ford Sr. (father) |
| Relatives | Ford family |
| Education | University of Pennsylvania (BA) University of Michigan (JD) |
| Website | Official website |
Harold Eugene Ford Jr. (born May 11, 1970)[1] is an American financial managing director,pundit, author, and former U.S. Congressman who served from 1997 to 2007 in theUnited States House of Representatives as a member of theDemocratic Party fromTennessee's 9th congressional district, centered inMemphis. He is a member of theFord political family from Memphis, and is the son of former CongressmanHarold Ford Sr., who held the same seat for 22 years. In 2006, Ford made anunsuccessful bid for theU.S. Senate seat vacated by the retiringBill Frist. He was also the last chairman of theDemocratic Leadership Council (DLC).[2]
Between 2011 and 2017, Ford worked forMorgan Stanley as a managing director.[3] He also regularly appeared on television on politically related programs onNBC'sMeet the Press,MSNBC,CNN,CNBC.[4]
On December 1, 2020, Ford was named Vice Chairman of Corporate & Institutional Banking atPNC Financial Services. He and his wife live in New York City and have a daughter, Georgia Walker,[citation needed] and a son, Harold Eugene III.[5]
Ford also wrote a book,More Davids Than Goliaths: A Political Education, published in 2010.[6]
In April 2021, Ford joinedFox News as a political contributor.[7] He frequently appears onSpecial Report as a panel member and was named a co-host ofThe Five in January 2022.[8]
Ford was born in Memphis, Tennessee, the eldest son of former RepresentativeHarold Ford Sr. and Dorothy Bowles Ford.[9] He has two brothers, Jake and Isaac, as well as twohalf-siblings, Andrew and Ava, from his father's second marriage.
The Ford family has long been prominent in Memphis's Black community. Ford's grandfather, N. J. Ford, established a funeral home, which gave the family a broad network in the community.E.H. Crump, a prominent white Democrat, dominated city and state politics in the early 20th century and befriended N.J. Ford.[10] Ford's uncle isJohn N. Ford, who is Harold Sr.'s brother and was a member of theTennessee State Senate until he was convicted on federal bribery charges in 2007 as part of theOperation Tennessee Waltz scandal.
Ford lived the first years of his life within the living quarters of his family-owned business N.J. Ford And Sons Funeral Home, which at the time was located in theRiverside neighborhood. He wasbaptized at his family church, Mt. Moriah-East Baptist Church. He attended Double Tree Elementary School, a publicMontessori school in the Westwood neighborhood, although graduated from the privateSt. Albans School, a prestigiousuniversity-preparatory school inWashington, D.C., which he attended after his father became a Congressman. He went on to earn aB.A. in American history from theUniversity of Pennsylvania in 1992.[11]
After graduation, Ford went into government, serving as a staff aide to theSenate Budget Committee. In 1993, he became special assistant at theUnited States Department of Commerce.[12]
Ford returned to university for aJ.D. degree from theUniversity of Michigan Law School in 1996. During his campaign for the House of Representatives, he sat for and failed the Tennesseebar exam; he said that he intended to try again;[13] as of 2014, he had not.[14]
When Harold Sr. decided not to seek a twelfth term in Congress in 1996, Harold Jr. entered the race and became the favorite in the Democratic primary, which was widely regarded as the real contest in the heavily Democratic, Black-majority 9th district. Ford arranged his schedule for his last semester of law school so he would not have Monday or Friday classes[15] and would be able to fly home to Memphis for an extended weekend each week to continue his campaign. As was expected, he easily won the Democraticprimary, followed by his election in November. Taking office at the age of twenty-six, he was one of theyoungest members of Congress in US history, the youngest in the 105th and 106th Congresses. He was also the first member of Congress born in the 1970s and, alongsideAdam Smith ofWashington, one of the first members ofGeneration X to serve in Congress. He was reelected four times without substantiveRepublican opposition by an average of eighty percent of the vote. In 2000, Ford was thekeynote speaker for the2000 Democratic National Convention, supporting thenVice PresidentAl Gore for the Democratic nomination forPresident.[16]
On 4 November 1999, Ford voted in favor of theGramm–Leach–Bliley Act,.[17] This act repealed much of theGlass–Steagall Act of 1933, which had been enacted to prevent any one organization from acting as any combination of an investment bank, a commercial bank, and an insurance company. The resulting repeal allowed many banks and insurance companies to invest money in varioussecurities that was raised from savings and checking bank accounts or insurance policies. Several economists, notablyNobel laureateJoseph Stiglitz, point to the repeal of Glass–Steagall as helping to create the conditions of the2008 financial crisis.[18][19]
On October 10, 2002, he was among the eighty-one House Democrats who voted in favor of authorizing theinvasion of Iraq.
After the Democrats lost seven Congressional seats in the2002 elections, Ford announced his candidacy for House Democratic Leader, challenging then-House Minority WhipNancy Pelosi, arguing that current leadership was ineffective.[20] Ford was defeated but exceeded initial expectations in the amount of support he received.[21] Although his name was mentioned as a possible Democratic vice presidential candidate in 2004,[22] he was ineligible for the office due to his age (four months shy of thirty-five onInauguration Day 2005).
A June 7, 2005, article inThe Washington Times reported that from 1998 to 2003, Ford took sixty-one privately funded trips but did not file travel disclosure forms with the House clerk for the trips, as required by the chamber's ethics rules until August 2003. Ford's office called the late filings a "mere oversight", since Ford had filed the required financial disclosure statements for the trips at the time they occurred.[23]
In November 2005, when Ohio Republican CongresswomanJean Schmidt implied that Pennsylvania DemocratJohn Murtha was a "coward" in response to Murtha's proposal for a withdrawal of American forces fromIraq, Ford charged across the House floor to the Republican side during the resulting uproar in the chamber, shouting "Say it to Murtha!" (or "Say Murtha's name!" depending on the source) while waving his finger at Schmidt. He had to be restrained by fellow DemocratDave Obey ofWisconsin. Like many Democrats, Ford believed Schmidt's remarks (which she later withdrew) were an unwarranted "cheap shot" against Murtha, a veteran of theMarine Corps.[24]
He supported the Republican effort to intercede in theTerri Schiavo case.[25] He opposed PresidentGeorge W. Bush's energy proposals (including oil drilling inArctic National Wildlife Refuge), demonstrated support foradoption rights ofsame-sex couples, is in favor of federal funding ofembryonic stem cell research, supporteduniversal healthcare coverage, opposed thedeath penalty and indicated a willingness to reformdrug policy.[26][27]
In addition, Ford sat on theHouse Budget Committee and theHouse Committee on Financial Services. He also served on the Transformation Advisory Group, a group of political, military and academic leaders who worked with theDepartment of Defense to assess the needs of the armed forces. Ford was a member of theNew Democrat Coalition, theCongressional Black Caucus and theBlue Dog Coalition.[11]
In 2002, Ford was mentioned as a possible Democratic candidate for the Senate seat being vacated byFred Thompson, but he declined to run. Instead, he supported fellow CongressmanBob Clement who would lose to former Republican GovernorLamar Alexander in the general election.[28]
In 2006, Ford did not run for re-election to the House of Representatives, due to hiscampaign for theUnited States Senate in Tennessee. Although he won the Democratic primary, he lost the general election by a margin of 2.7%. His younger brother, Jake Ford, ran for the9th district seat as an Independent, but lost to DemocratSteve Cohen.
On April 6, 2005, during an interview onC-SPAN's call-in showWashington Journal, Ford confirmed that he would be running for theUnited States Senate.[29] He filed the papers necessary to officially begin his Senate campaign on May 25, 2005.
Democratic State SenatorRosalind Kurita briefly challenged Ford for the nomination but dropped out of the primary because of inadequate fundraising, effectively handing Ford the nomination.[30] On August 3, 2006, Ford overwhelmingly won the Democratic primary. After the primary, Ford's supporters held a large victory celebration atNashville'sLP Field, nowNissan Stadium. Among the speakers was formerU.S. PresidentBill Clinton.
Ford faced RepublicanBob Corker in the November 2006 election. Not long after Corker's primary victory was assured, Ford challenged Corker to seven televised debates across the state. In response, Corker said he would debate Ford, though he did not agree to seven debates.[citation needed]
In October 2006, the Republican Party ran radio and television ads characterized by some as racist. A radio spot, referred to by critics as the "jungle drums" ad, had drums playing when Ford's name was mentioned and patriotic music when Corker's name was spoken. This ad was criticized as attacking Ford's race by evoking images of primitive, chanting African tribes.[31] Atelevision ad that received more attention featured satirical "man‑on‑the‑street" interviews purporting to support Ford, including one in which a blond white woman talks about meeting Ford at "the Playboy party"; she returns at the end of the ad to wink and whisper in a seductive tone, "Harold, call me." The ad was denounced by many people, including Republican former SenatorWilliam Cohen, who called it "a very serious appeal to aracist sentiment", and Corker asked the Republican leadership to pull the ad. The ad was retired one day afterRepublican National Committee ChairmanKen Mehlman said he had no authority to discontinue the ad and disagreed with the negative characterizations of it.[32][33][34]
Corker and Ford participated in a televised debate inMemphis on October 7, in Corker's hometown of Chattanooga on October 10, and inNashville on October 28. In January 2006,NBC'sMeet the Press extended an open invitation for the candidates to debate on the nationally televised show.
On November 8, Ford conceded the election to Corker, who defeated Ford by less than three percentage points.[35]
In December 2006, theLos Angeles Times reported that Ford told students at an L.A.-area school that he might run again in 2008 for the Senate seat held by RepublicanLamar Alexander, but in January 2007 Ford said that he had no plans to challenge theincumbent.[36][37] Instead, Ford has said that he "hopes to spend a lot of time at home, perhaps do some teaching and work withGovernor Bredesen on some issues in Tennessee."[38]
On January 25, 2007, Ford was named chairman of theDemocratic Leadership Council.[39]
In March 2007, Ford joined the financial services firmMerrill Lynch as a vice chairman and senior policy adviser.[40][41] In the same month he was hired byFox News Channel as a political contributor.[42] In March 2008, he moved from Fox toMSNBC as a news analyst, appearing as a panelist onDavid Gregory'sRace for the White House,Hardball, andMorning Joe.[43]
Ford was appointed visiting professor of public policy atVanderbilt University in 2007 and taught a class on American political leadership.[44] In October 2007, Ford was appointed as the inaugural Barbara Jordan Visiting Professor at theLyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at theUniversity of Texas at Austin.[45] As of the spring 2010 semester, he is a visiting professor atNew York University'sWagner School of Public Service where he teaches Policy Formation: U.S. Domestic Policy.[46] In the fall of 2015 he was a visiting faculty member at the University of Michigan Ford School of Public Policy.[47]
Ford worked at the Wall Street firmMorgan Stanley as a managing director.[48] In late 2017, erroneous media reports said that he was fired for sexual misconduct[49][50] and Morgan Stanley issued a statement the following month saying that no sexual misconduct took place.[51] In January 2018,The New York Times reported that Ford reached a legal settlement with Morgan Stanley.[52][51]
Ford is on the Board of Selectors ofJefferson Awards for Public Service.[53] He is also a member of the ReFormers Caucus ofIssue One.[54]
Ford considered aprimary challenge to SenatorKirsten Gillibrand inNew York in 2010.[2] Sources close to then-Mayor of New YorkMichael Bloomberg said that he would consider supporting someone "of Mr. Ford's stature",[2] although it was also reported that Bloomberg "reassured [Harry Reid, the then-Senate Majority Leader ] that he was not personally involved in the effort to promote a Ford candidacy."[55]Chuck Schumer sought to dissuade Ford from running.[55]
On February 5, 2010, Gillibrand held a press conference at which she raised questions as to whether Ford, as an executive of Merrill Lynch, received taxpayer-backed bonuses from Bank of America, stemming from thefederal bailout. She was joined byNew York City Public AdvocateBill de Blasio, who endorsed her candidacy.[56]
On February 12, it was reported that Ford's NBC contract was suspended due to his potential campaign, and that he had taken an unpaid leave of absence from Merrill Lynch for the same reason.[57] On March 1, Ford stated in anop-ed article published byThe New York Times that he would not run against Gillibrand.[58][59]
Ford married Emily Threlkeld, who works in public relations forCarolina Herrera in New York, on April 26, 2008.[60] They have a daughter, Georgia Walker Ford.[citation needed] Their second child, a son, Harold Eugene Ford III, was born in May 2015.[5]
| Year | Democrat | Votes | Pct | Republican | Votes | Pct | 3rd Party | Party | Votes | Pct | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Harold E. Ford Jr. | 116,345 | 61% | Rod DeBerry | 70,951 | 37% | Silky Sullivan | Independent | 957 | 1% | * | |||
| 1998 | Harold E. Ford Jr. | 75,428 | 79% | Claude Burdikoff | 18,078 | 19% | Gwendolyn L. Moore | Independent | 932 | 1% | * | |||
| 2000 | Harold E. Ford Jr. | 143,298 | 100% | (no candidate) | * | |||||||||
| 2002 | Harold E. Ford Jr. | 120,904 | 84% | (no candidate) | Tony Rush | Independent | 23,208 | 16% | * | |||||
| 2004 | Harold E. Ford Jr. | 190,648 | 82% | Ruben M. Fort | 41,578 | 18% | * |
*Write-in and minor candidate notes: In 1996, Mary D. Taylor received 498 votes; Anthony Burton received 424 votes; Greg Voehringer received 327 votes; Tom Jeanette received 222 votes; Del Gill received 199 votes; Bill Taylor received 179 votes; Johnny E. Kelly received 156 votes; Don Fox received 146 votes; and write-ins received 10 votes. In 1998, Johnny Kelly received 775 votes; Greg Voehringer received 567 votes; and write-ins received 2 votes. In 2000, write-ins received 36 votes. In 2002, write-ins received 148 votes. In 2004, Jim Maynard received 166 votes.
2006 Democratic Primary for U.S. Senate (TN)
| Year | Democrat | Votes | Pct | Republican | Votes | Pct | 3rd Party | Party | Votes | Pct | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2006 | Harold Ford Jr. | 879,976 | 48% | Bob Corker | 929,911 | 51% | Ed Choate | Independent | 10,831 | 1% | * |
*Write-in and minor candidate notes: In 2006, David "None of the Above" Gatchell received 3,746 votes, Emory "Bo" Heyward received 3,580 votes, H. Gary Keplinger received 3,033 votes and Chris Lugo (Green) received 2,589 votes.
| U.S. House of Representatives | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromTennessee's 9th congressional district 1997–2007 | Succeeded by |
| Honorary titles | ||
| Preceded by | Baby of the House 1997–2001 | Succeeded by |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Keynote Speaker of theDemocratic National Convention 2000 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Democratic nominee forU.S. Senator from Tennessee (Class 1) 2006 | Succeeded by Mark E. Clayton |
| Preceded by | Chair of theDemocratic Leadership Council 2007–2011 | Position abolished |
| U.S. order of precedence (ceremonial) | ||
| Preceded byas Former U.S. Representative | Order of precedence of the United States as Former U.S. Representative | Succeeded byas Former U.S. Representative |
| International | |
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| National | |
| People | |
| Other | |
