Tom Ridge | |
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1st United States Secretary of Homeland Security | |
In office January 24, 2003 – February 1, 2005 |
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President | George W. Bush |
Preceded by | Position established |
Succeeded by | Michael Chertoff |
1st United States Homeland Security Advisor | |
In office October 5, 2001 – January 24, 2003 |
|
President | George W. Bush |
Preceded by | Position established |
Succeeded by | John Gordon |
43rd Governor of Pennsylvania | |
In office January 17, 1995 – October 5, 2001 |
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Lieutenant | Mark Schweiker |
Preceded by | Bob Casey |
Succeeded by | Mark Schweiker |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania's 21st district |
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In office January 3, 1983 – January 3, 1995 |
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Preceded by | Don Bailey |
Succeeded by | Phil English |
Personal details | |
Born | August 26, 1945 Munhall, Pennsylvania, United States |
Political party | Republican |
Spouse(s) | Michele Ridge |
Children | Lesley and Tommy |
Alma mater | Harvard College (B.A.) Dickinson School of Law (J.D.) |
Religion | Roman Catholic |
Military service | |
Service/branch | United States Army |
Rank | staff sergeant |
Unit | 23rd Infantry Division |
Battles/wars | Vietnam War |
Awards | Bronze Star National Defense Service Medal Vietnam Service Medal Vietnam Campaign Medal Vietnam Gallantry Cross Combat Infantryman Badge |
Thomas Joseph "Tom" Ridge (born August 26, 1945) is an American politician who served as a member of the United States House of Representatives (1983–1995), the 43rd Governor of Pennsylvania (1995–2001), Assistant to the President for Homeland Security (2001–2003), and the first United States Secretary of Homeland Security (2003–2005). Since re-entering the private sector, Ridge has served on the boards of The Home Depot, The Hershey Company and Exelon Corporation and as a senior advisor to Deloitte & Touche, and TechRadium. Ridge is also the founder and CEO of Ridge Global, LLC, a Washington, D.C. based security consulting firm. Ridge spent time campaigning with Senator John McCain during his 2008 bid for the presidency and was believed by some to have been in the short list of potential running mates.[1][2]
Ridge was born in Munhall, Pennsylvania, in Pittsburgh's Steel Valley, the oldest of three children. His parents were Laura (née Sudimack) and Thomas Regis Ridge, who was a traveling salesman and Navy veteran. Ridge's maternal grandparents were Carpatho-Rusyn immigrants[3] from the former Czechoslovakia (now Slovakia), and his paternal great-grandparents emigrated from Great Britain.[4] Ridge was raised in veterans' public housing in Erie, Pennsylvania. He was educated at St. Andrews Elementary School and Cathedral Preparatory School and did well both academically and in sports. He earned a scholarship to Harvard College, where he paid his way through with construction work, played intramural baseball and football,[4] and graduated with honors in 1967.
After his first year at the Dickinson School of Law, he was drafted into the United States Army, where he served as an infantry staff sergeant in the 23rd Infantry Division[5] during the Vietnam War. He earned the Bronze Star, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Vietnam Campaign Medal, Vietnam Gallantry Cross Unit Citation with Palm, and the Combat Infantryman Badge. Later, he was offered a commission as an officer but turned it down when he learned that it would require an extra year of service.
A ruptured appendix cut short his tour and he returned home in 1970; service also aggravated a childhood ear infection. Since then Ridge has had a hearing aid in his left ear.
After returning to Pennsylvania, he completed his Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree at the Dickinson School of Law, graduating in 1972, and entered private practice.
He became Assistant District Attorney in Erie County, Pennsylvania in 1980 and prosecuted 86 cases in two years. In 1982 he successfully ran for a seat in Congress from northwestern Pennsylvania, and was re-elected six times. Ridge was notable as the first enlisted Vietnam combat veteran elected to the U.S. House. As of 2009[update], Ridge has never lost an election for public office.
In 1994, despite being little-known outside of northwest Pennsylvania, Ridge ran for Governor. He won the election as a pro-choice Republican. He was reelected in 1998 with 57 percent of the vote in a four-way race. His share of the vote in that election was the highest for a Republican governor in Pennsylvania (where Democrats outnumber Republicans by almost 500,000) in more than half a century.[6] Ridge served as Governor until his resignation to become the Director of Homeland Security in 2001.
As governor, he promoted "law and order" policies, supporting a three-strikes law and a faster death penalty process. A death penalty supporter,[7] Ridge signed more than 224 execution warrants[8] – five times the number signed over a 25-year period by the two previous governors – but only three voluntary executions were carried out. On social issues, he opposed gay marriage, and, in spite of being a Roman Catholic, is pro-choice on abortion issues.
The Governor nominated Dr. Peter J. Jannetta to be his secretary of health. Dr. Jannetta was known to the governor to have testified perjuriously in Court, the Pennsylvania Superior Court stating, "We have little difficulty in concluding that Dr. Jannetta's testimony at deposition was different than, or inconsistent with, the testimony at trial." However, it is worth noting that Dr. Jannetta was never convicted of perjury. Levy v Jannetta, CCP Allegheny County, GD 81-7689; appeal -J. A370017/92 Levy v Jannetta et al., No. 00150 Pittsburgh, 1992. settled, 1995." Dr. Jannetta served as Governor Ridge's health secretary for 6 months.
Over Ridge's tenure, the Commonwealth's budget grew by two to three percent per fiscal year and combined tax reductions totaled over $2 billion. Ridge created and grew a "Rainy Day" Fund balance to over $1 billion to be utilized during an economic downturn or recession.
Ridge pushed for legislation permitting competition among electric utilities and enhanced federal and state support for the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). He also separated the Commonwealth's environmental regulatory and conservation programs into two new agencies; the Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
Ridge proposed the creation of public charter schools in Pennsylvania and in establishing alternate schools for disruptive students. He launched new academic standards that established academic expectations for what students were expected to know in different grades. Ridge also proposed a school choice demonstration program.
Ridge oversaw a number of e-government projects including renewing drivers' licenses and vehicle registrations to viewing historical documents and library catalogs. The Commonwealth's portal won several national awards. One of the nation's first electronic grant systems was put into place at the Pennsylvania Department of Education. Ridge also created the Link-to-Learn initiative to increase the effective use of technology in public schools and universities.
In 2001, he was named runner up "Politician of the Year" by PoliticsPA.[9] In a 2002 PoliticsPA Feature story designating politicians with yearbook superlatives, he was named the "Most Popular."[10]
Ridge served as a close advisor to GOP presidential nominee George W. Bush, a close friend from their simultaneous tenures as governors, during the 2000 presidential campaign. In return, Bush named Ridge to his short list for possible running mates, along with New York Governor George Pataki, Michigan Governor John Engler, Oklahoma Governor Frank Keating, former Missouri Senator John Danforth, and former American Red Cross President Elizabeth Dole.[11]
However, Bush selected the man who was in charge of leading his search for the vice presidential nominee, former Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, to be his running mate.
Ridge was also reportedly [says who?] Colin Powell's choice to be Secretary of Defense in Bush's new cabinet. With his reputation as a former Congressman and a strong administrator as governor, in addition to his friendship with Bush and Powell, he was seen as a frontrunner for the post. But he lost this presumptive appointment after much decrying by conservatives over his lack of defense experience, particularly by Republican primary candidate Gary Bauer, who decried Ridge as a "peacenik-type of congressman during the Reagan years" and Robert Novak who wrote of Ridge's lack of defense experience and his opposition to the Strategic Defense Initiative. There was also rumored to be a lot of animosity regarding the nomination between Powell and Dick Cheney regarding Ridge. With all of this Ridge promptly took his name out of the running and Donald Rumsfeld was eventually named as defense secretary.
Following the September 11, 2001, suicide attacks, U.S. President George W. Bush created the Office of Homeland Security within the White House, and named Ridge to head it. The charge to the nation's new director of homeland security was to develop and coordinate a comprehensive national strategy to strengthen the United States against terrorist threats or attacks. In the words of President George W. Bush, he had the strength, experience, personal commitment and authority to accomplish this critical mission. Ridge formally resigned as Pennsylvania's governor on October 5, 2001.
In January 2003 and after the passage of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the Office of Homeland Security split into a Cabinet-level Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and the White House Homeland Security Advisory Council. Ridge left the White House and became the first Secretary of Homeland Security. The Department's Mission "is to (A) prevent terrorist attacks within the United States; (B) reduce the vulnerability of the United States to terrorism; and (C) minimize the damage, and assist in the recovery, from terrorist attacks that do occur within the United States" (From H.R. 5005-8 the Homeland Security Act of 2002). The newly created Department was the most comprehensive reorganization of the Federal government since the National Security Act of 1947. The Department of Homeland Security consolidates 22 agencies and 180,000 employees, unifying once-fragmented Federal functions in a single agency dedicated to protecting America from terrorism. Ridge worked with the employees from combined agencies to strengthen borders, provide for intelligence analysis and infrastructure protection, improve the use of science and technology to counter weapons of mass destruction, and to create a comprehensive response and recovery division.[12][13][14][15][16][17]
In January 2004, Ridge was named among others in a lawsuit filed by a Syrian-born Canadian Maher Arar who said he was tortured in Syria after being deported by American authorities.[18]
On November 30, 2004, Ridge submitted his resignation to the President, saying, "After more than 22 consecutive years of public service, it is time to give personal and family matters a higher priority."[19] In his book The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege...and How We Can Be Safe Again, Ridge says his resignation was due to an effort by senior Bush administration officials to raise the nation's terror alert level in the days before the 2004 presidential vote.[20][21]
Ridge is the founder and CEO of Ridge Global, an advisory firm in Washington, D.C.[22]
Ridge served on a state-appointed incident review panel which investigated the Virginia Tech massacre of April 2007.[23]
In July 2010, companies seeking to use hydraulic fracturing to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale formation engaged Ridge and his company at $75,000 a month to help them gain support.[24]
In February 2005, Tom Ridge was named to the board of Home Depot.[25] Ridge's compensation was expected to be about $100,000 per annum for this position.[26] Since April 2005, Ridge has also served on the board of Savi Technology,[27] the primary technology provider for the wireless cargo-monitoring network for the United States Department of Defense.[28]
In April, 2005, Ridge's appointment to the board of the Illinois/Pennsylvania/New Jersey electric utility was announced, with starting director compensation of $35,000 annual retainer plus a $1,500 meeting fee or per diem fee. Directors were also granted $60,000 in deferred stock units each year at that time.[29]
In 2010, it was reported that Ridge had appeared on MSNBC Hardball With Chris Matthews promoting nuclear energy as part of a "green agenda [to] ... create jobs, create exports," without any revelation by him or the cable channel of his Exelon position. In the report, his cumulative Exelon-derived compensation was put at $530,659; and it was said that, as of March 2009, he held an estimated $248,299 in Exelon stock, according to SEC filings. Exelon was described as "the nation's largest nuclear power company."[30]
In November 2006, Tom Ridge was announced as a Senior Advisor for Deloitte & Touche USA LLP.[31][32]
In November 2007, Ridge was named to serve on The Hershey Company's Executive Board. The Hershey Trust, the primary shareholder of Hershey, asked for a change in board composition after several years of poor stock performance. The board named Ridge to the board for his knowledge of economics.[33]
Announced in January 2008, Tom Ridge will serve as a senior advisor to TechRadium, Inc., a Texas-based security technology company that provides its patented alert and notification system, IRIS (Immediate Response Information System), to a wide range of users including municipalities, public schools and universities, utilities, and military programs.[34]
In September 2009, PURE Bioscience, creator of a patented antimicrobial, announced Ridge would serve on its Advisory Board along with former Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson.[35]
Tom Ridge served as a senior aide to Republican Presidential candidate Senator John McCain of Arizona,[36] and was considered by some as a possible running mate for McCain.[1][2]
According to Fox News, many Republicans hoped Ridge would run for the United States Senate against the newly turned Democrat Arlen Specter, who stated he would seek re-election in 2010 in the Democratic primary. Already seeking the Republican nomination was former Representative Pat Toomey, who narrowly lost to Specter in the Republican primary in 2004. Some Republicans thought Ridge would have a better chance against Specter than would Toomey. A Quinnipiac University poll conducted between April 30, 2009 and May 3, 2009 placed Ridge within three points of Specter in a hypothetical matchup between the two men.[37] Some Toomey supporters criticized the idea of a Ridge candidacy because, although Ridge was still registered to vote in Pennsylvania, he was actually living in Chevy Chase, Maryland.[38]
On May 7, 2009, Ridge announced that he would not be a candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2010.[39]
Tom Ridge's book The Test of Our Times was published in September 2009.[40] Written with Larry Bloom, it concerns Ridge's time as the head of the Department of Homeland Security. He explains the challenges and decision making processes of the newly formed department, and gives his own views as to the future of the security of the United States of America. The book further discusses
"the infighting he saw that frustrated his attempts to build a smooth-running department. Among the headlines promoted by publisher Thomas Dunne Books: Ridge was never invited to sit in on National Security Council meetings; was 'blindsided' by the FBI in morning Oval Office meetings because the agency withheld critical information from him; found his urgings to block Michael Brown from being named head of the emergency agency blamed for the Hurricane Katrina disaster ignored; and was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush's re-election, something he saw as politically motivated and worth resigning over."[21]
Ridge wrote in his memoir that then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and then-Attorney General John Ashcroft pressured him to raise the terror alert level, running up to the 2004 elections, because of a pre-election message critical of President Bush from Osama Bin Laden.[20]
He now does after-dinner speeches around the world. In July 2010, a controversy surrounded Ridge's warning that countries would face the wrath of al-Qaeda and countries such as Ireland could be at risk of "terrorist" attacks.[41]
Tom Ridge has endorsed former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman for president in the 2012 Republican primaries.[42]
Tom's wife, Michele Ridge, is the former executive director of the Erie County Library System. They have been married since 1979 and have two children: Lesley and Tommy.
1994 Pennsylvania Gubernatorial Election[43] | |||||
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Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
Republican | Tom Ridge | 1,627,976 | 45.40 | ||
Democratic | Mark Singel | 1,430,099 | 39.89 | ||
Constitution | Peg Luksik | 460,269 | 12.84 |
1998 Pennsylvania Gubernatorial Election[44] | |||||
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Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
Republican | Tom Ridge (incumbent) | 1,736,844 | 57.42 | ||
Democratic | Ivan Itkin | 938,745 | 31.03 | ||
Constitution | Peg Luksik | 315,761 | 10.44 | ||
Libertarian | Ken V. Krawchuk | 33,591 | 1.10 |
United States House of Representatives | ||
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Preceded by Don Bailey |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania's 21st congressional district 1983–1995 |
Succeeded by Phil English |
Political offices | ||
Preceded by Bob Casey |
Governor of Pennsylvania 1995–2001 |
Succeeded by Mark Schweiker |
Preceded by New creation |
United States Homeland Security Advisor 2001–2003 |
Succeeded by John Gordon |
Preceded by New creation |
United States Secretary of Homeland Security Served under: George W. Bush 2003–2004 |
Succeeded by Michael Chertoff |
Party political offices | ||
Preceded by Barbara Hafer |
Republican nominee for Governor of Pennsylvania 1994 (won), 1998 (won) |
Succeeded by Michael Fisher |
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