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Russell Dana Feingold (born March 2, 1953) has been a U.S. senator from Wisconsin since 1993. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was born in Janesville, Wisconsin and graduated from Joseph A. Craig High School. He later graduated from UW-Madison with honors in 1975, went to the University of Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship in 1977, and finished Harvard University Law School in 1979 with honors. He worked as an attorney at law for Foley & Lardner and La Follette & Sinykin from 1979 until 1985. In 1982 he was elected to the Wisconsin State Senate where he served until his election to the United States Senate.

Feingold's senatorial career began in 1992 with a surprising victory over Republican incumbent Robert W. Kasten, Jr.. Feingold won the Democratic Senate primary against two formidable opponents, then produced several offbeat political ads emphasizing Kasten's lack of availability to the people of Wisconsin during the general election. The nation was stunned by Feingold's victory, won on a pittance of campaign money. Kasten was as well; he broke into tears in his concession speech. Feingold, meanwhile, celebrated at a hotel in Middleton, where he lives. Feingold continued to oppose soft money during his 1998 reelection campaign, in spite of his opponent throwing millions of dollars of attack ads against him. In the end Feingold squeaked out a 2% win. In 2004 he accepted a larger amount of money for his reelection campaign.

Senator Feingold is perhaps best known for his work alongside Senator John McCain on the campaign finance reform law, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, known as the McCain-Feingold bill. His signature issues are campaign finance reform, fair trade policies, health care reform, environmentalism, a multilateral foreign policy, preserving Social Security, and abolishing the death penalty. Senator Feingold was the only Democratic senator to vote against a motion to dismiss Congress' 1998-1999 impeachment case of then-President Bill Clinton, and in 2001 was the deciding vote to allow a full floor vote on the confirmation of Attorney General John Ashcroft. Neither decision was popular with his party, but Feingold claims that he voted based on respect for the due process of law and the right for a President to choose his Cabinet, not because of his own personal opinions on Clinton or Ashcroft. Feingold has also been an opponent of NAFTA and other free trade agreements, an unpopular position among some Democrats, but one lauded by others.

Feingold was the only senator to vote against the USA PATRIOT Act, which, he said, infringed upon citizens' civil liberties. Many at the time predicted his political career was over, but a majority of Wisconsin residents had little problem with his vote. Later, as public opinion turned against certain portions of the Act, his vote became a major selling-point for his re-election campaign.

Recently, the senator has been devoting his attention to the issue of Congressional pay raises. During his 1992 campaign, one of his three major campaign promises was that he would accept no pay raises during his term. Since then, he has returned more than $50,000 of pay raises to the U.S. Treasury. He is, perhaps, one of Congress's least wealthy members, with a declared net worth of $150,000.

Americans For Democratic Action, a liberal advocacy group which rates members of Congress on a scale of 0 to 100, with zero being totally conservative and 100 being completely progressive, gave Senator Feingold a lifetime average rating of 96. With the death of Minnesota's Senator Paul Wellstone in 2002, this makes Feingold the most progressive man in the Senate. His rating ties him with California's Senator Barbara Boxer for the title of the most progressive person in the Senate. At the same time, the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan advocacy group that pushes for fiscal responsibility, has placed him on its "Senate Honor Role" every year since 1997, usually in the highest or second-highest ranking, indicating that Senator Feingold is also one of the top budget hawks in Congress.

Senator Feingold regularly holds "listening sessions" in all 72 Wisconsin counties to listen to his constituents' concerns, and has held more than 850 since he was elected to office.

In the 2004 Senate elections, Feingold defeated Republican candidate Tim Michels 56%-44%, earning a third term. The victory was seen by many pundits as a vindication of the many controversial stances that he had taken during his second term, as it was by far his largest electoral victory thus far. His margins of victory in his previous two senate campaigns had been one and two percent, respectively. Feingold even won many counties which also supported the re-election of Republican president George W. Bush. Perhaps as a result of his success, in late December 2004 Feingold was appointed as one of four deputy whips for Senate Democrats. Feingold pledged the new role would not sway his maverick stance within the party or the chamber.

On December 21, 2004, Feingold wrote an article for popular webzine Salon.com regarding his golfing trip to Greenville, Alabama. After noting how friendly the people were, and that Wisconsin had many similar places, he expressed his sorrow that such a poverty-stricken area was "the reddest spot on the whole map", in spite of Republican policies that Feingold considered incredibly destructive to the lives of the poor and middle class. Alabama's Republican governor, Bob Riley and Greenville mayor Dexter McLendon were perturbed at Feingold's description of, "check-cashing stores and abject trailer parks, and some of the hardest-used cars for sale on a very rundown lot." McLendon invited Feingold back for a more complete tour of the city, and Feingold agreed.

There is also talk of Feingold seeking the Democratic Party's Presidential nomination in 2008. In December of 2004 a Draft Feingold website showed up.

Committee Assignments

• Committee on the Judiciary
  • Constitution Subcommittee, ranking member
• Committee on Foreign Relations
  • Africa Subcommittee, ranking member
• Committee on the Budget
• Special Committee on Aging

External link

• Senate home page
• Feingold for Senate
• 10/1 Feingold speech on his vote against Patriot Act
• Senator Feingold's recent voting record

• 1953 births
• United States Senators