Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 20...
Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of State of California in the early 1970s; Brown later served as Mayor of Oakland from 1999 to 2007 and Attorney General of California from 2007 to 2011. He was both the oldest and sixth-youngest governor of California due to the 28-year gap between his second and third terms. Upon completing his fourth term in office, Brown became the third longest-serving governor in U.S. history, serving 16 years and 5 days in office.Born in San Francisco, he was the son of Bernice Layne Brown and Pat Brown, who was the 32nd Governor of California (1959–1967). After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley and Yale University, he practiced law and began his political career as a member of the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees (1969–1971). He was elected to serve as the 23rd Secretary of State of California from 1971 to 1975. At 36, Brown was elected to his first term as governor in 1974, making him the youngest California Governor in 111 years. In 1978, he won his second term. During his governorship, Brown ran unsuccessfully as a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1976 and 1980. He declined to pursue a third term as governor in 1982, instead making an unsuccessful run for the United States Senate that same year.
After traveling abroad, he returned to California and served as the sixth Chairman of the California Democratic Party (1989–1991), attempting to run for U.S. President once more in 1992. He then moved to Oakland, where he hosted a talk radio show; Brown soon returned to public life, serving as Mayor of Oakland (1999–2007) and Attorney General of California (2007–2011). He ran for his third and fourth terms as governor in 2010 and 2014, his eligibility to do so having stemmed from California's constitutional grandfather clause. On October 7, 2013, he became the longest-serving governor in the history of California, surpassing Earl Warren.
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Rahm Emanuel
Rahm Israel Emanuel (; born November 29, 1959) is an American politician who served as the 55th mayor of Chicago from 2011 to 2019. A member of the De...
Rahm Israel Emanuel (; born November 29, 1959) is an American politician who served as the 55th mayor of Chicago from 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 23rd White House Chief of Staff from 2009 to 2010, and as a member of the United States House of Representatives from Chicago between 2003 and 2009.
Born in Chicago, Emanuel is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and Northwestern University. Working early in his career in Democratic politics, Emanuel was appointed as director of the finance committee for Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign. In 1993, he joined the Clinton administration, where he served as the assistant to the president for political affairs and as the Senior Advisor to the President for policy and strategy. Beginning a career in finance, Emanuel worked at the investment bank Wasserstein Perella & Co. from 1998 for 2½ years, and served on the board of directors of Freddie Mac. In 2002, Emanuel ran for the seat in the U.S. House of Representatives vacated by Rod Blagojevich, who resigned to become governor of Illinois. Emanuel won the first of three terms representing Illinois's 5th congressional district, a seat he held from 2003 to 2009. As the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, he oversaw Democratic wins in the 2006 United States House of Representatives elections, allowing the party to gain control of the chamber for the first time since 1994. After the 2008 presidential election, President Barack Obama appointed Emanuel to serve as White House chief of staff.
In October 2010, Emanuel resigned as chief of staff to run as a candidate in Chicago's 2011 mayoral election. Emanuel won with 55% of the vote over five other candidates in the non-partisan mayoral election, succeeding 22-year incumbent Richard M. Daley. At his reelection, although Emanuel failed to obtain an absolute majority in the February 2015 mayoral election, he defeated Cook County board commissioner (and later U.S. Representative) Jesús "Chuy" García in the subsequent run-off election in April. In late 2015, Emanuel's approval rating plunged to "the low 20s" in response to a series of scandals. These followed and were attributed to the police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, the city's subsequent attempts to withhold a video of the shooting, and the lack of an investigation into the matter.
Emanuel initially announced in October 2017 he planned to run for a third term, but on September 4, 2018, he reversed his decision and announced that he would not seek a third term due to personal obligations. The Chicago Tribune assessed Emanuel's performance as mayor as "mixed." At one point, half of Chicagoans favored Emanuel's resignation. He later made steady progress in recovering his political support. He left office in May 2019 and was succeeded by Lori Lightfoot.
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