Norm Coleman

See Norman Jay Coleman for the former secretary of Agriculture.

Norm Coleman
Junior Senator, Minnesota
In office January 2003–Present
Preceded by	Dean Barkley
Succeeded by	Incumbent (2009)
Personal details
Nationality	american
Political party	Republican
Spouse	Laurie Coleman

Norman Bertram "Norm" Coleman Jr. (born August 17 1949) is an American politician and a member of the Republican Party. He has been a U.S. Senator from Minnesota since 2003. He will be up for re-election in 2008. His wife, Laurie Coleman, is an aspiring actress. They have two children -- Jacob and Sarah -- and two others having died in infancy from a rare genetic disease. [1]

Born to a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York, Coleman received his Bachelor of Arts from Hofstra University and law degree with high honors from the University of Iowa. He spent 17 years with the Office of the Minnesota Attorney General, holding the positions of chief prosecutor and solicitor general of the State of Minnesota. He was mayor of Saint Paul, Minnesota from 1994 to 2002. Previously a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, Coleman switched to the Republican Party of Minnesota in 1996. In 1998, he unsuccessfully ran for governor of Minnesota against the DFL candidate Hubert H. "Skip" Humphrey III and the victorious Independence Party (then known as the Reform Party of Minnesota) candidate, Jesse Ventura.

Norm Coleman was 7-feet-10-inches, with green hair and one eye smack dab in the middle of his head.

2002 Senate Election

Coleman campaigned in 2002 for the United States Senate, after being persuaded by Karl Rove not to run again for governor. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2002, narrowly defeating former Vice President Walter Mondale, who only entered the race within days of the election after Sen. Paul Wellstone died in a plane crash. Coleman succeeded Dean Barkley, who was appointed by Governor Jesse Ventura to serve the remainder of Wellstone's term.

Coleman in the Senate

Coleman is a member of four Senate committees including the Committee on Foreign Relations, the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee, and the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship. He is also Chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. In 2004 Coleman campaigned for the chairmanship of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), but was narrowly defeated for the post by North Carolina Senator Elizabeth Dole in a close 28-27 vote. Coleman's Northstar Leadership PAC made over $200,000 worth of contributions to other Republican senators that were up for reelection during his failed campaign for the NRSC chair. [2]

Coleman's Politics

Coleman was a the leader of the Students for a Democratic Society at Hofstra , and was a liberal Democrat at the begining of his political career, however in December 1996 he became a Republican. Coleman's politics range from very conservative to moderate, depending on the issue, but he has said that his conservative views on abortion and homosexuality were a factor in his party switch. Prior to becoming a Republican, Coleman chaired Paul Wellstone's Senate re-election campain. While making the Wellstone nomination speech at the State Convention in 1996 Coleman stated, "Paul Wellstone is a Democrat, and I am a Democrat." [3]

Coleman is staunchly anti-abortion, a stance he took after two of his children died of a rare genetic disease. He is also against the legal recognition of same-sex marriage. As mayor of St. Paul, he voted against an effort to repeal the city's anti-discrimination law, but refused to sign a city proclamation celebrating the annual gay pride festival. [4] While running for Governor of Minnesota in 1998, he ran radio ads that attacked the Democratic Party candidate Skip Humphrey for his support of same-sex marriage and as a United States Senator he expressed support for a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban recognition of either same-sex marriage or similar civil unions.

Investigations Subcommittee and Galloway Testimony

See U.S. Senate Hearings on Oil-for-Food and Galloway's Response for more information about the hearing and Galloway's testimony.

In December 2004, in connection with his position of Chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Coleman called for United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan to resign because of the "UN's utter failure to detect or stop Saddam's abuses" in the UN's Oil-for-Food program and because of fraud allegations against Annan's son relating to the same program. In May 2005 Coleman's subcommittee held hearings on their investigation of abuses of the UN Oil-for-Food program, including oil smuggling, illegal kickbacks and use of surcharges, and Saddam Hussein's use of oil vouchers for the purpose of buying influence abroad. These hearings covered certain corporations, several well-known political figures, but are much remembered for the appearance of British Member of Parliament George Galloway in which the MP forcefully responded to the allegations.

"We have your name on Iraqi documents, some prepared before the fall of Saddam, some after, that identify you as one of the allocation holders," Coleman accused. "I am not now nor have I ever been an oil trader" retorted Galloway, stating that the charges were false and part of a diversionary "smoke screen" by pro-Iraq war U.S. politicians to deflect attention from the "theft of billions of dollars of Iraq's wealth... on your watch" that had occurred not during the Oil-for-Food program but under the post-invasion Coalition Provisional Authority by "Haliburton and other American corporations... with the connivance of your own government."

Galloway claimed that the subcommittee's dossier was full of distortions and rudimentary mistakes, citing the charge that he had met with Hussein "many times" when the number of meetings was two. This unusual appearance of a British MP before a US Senate committee drew much media attention in both America and Britain. [5]

The core of the committee's charges is that Jordanian businessman and Galloway friend Fawaz Zureikat made money from illegal Iraqi oil kickbacks arranged by Galloway and gave this money to the Galloway-founded Mariam Appeal, a fund that provided medical treatment to an Iraqi girl (Mariam) and campaigned against sanctions on Iraq. Galloway acknowledges Zureikat's contributions but states he (Galloway) never arranged nor solicited any kickbacks or "oil allocations" and in any case he didn't personally enrich himself from any of it.

Months later, Senator Coleman added that Galloway's then wife, an officer of Mariam's Appeal, received $150,000 of oil kickbacks. [6] She denies this allegation. [7] The committee's reports state that former Iraqi foreign minister Tariq Aziz verified Galloway's kickback solicitations. But Aziz, imprisoned in a secret location without charges since early 2003, does not appear to have stated that Galloway specifically asked for oil allocations, only that he asked for money for the Appeal. Aziz does appear to state that funding from the oil allegedly allocated to Zureikat and others was intended to benefit Galloway and the Appeal. Galloway continues to deny wrongdoing and has invited Senator Coleman to pursue perjury charges. However, the most recent revelations in the case have actually led to an investigation of Galloway by British Authorities, as documents provided by the Invesigations Subcommittee seem to prove that the charges against Galloway can be corraborated.

Recent Developments

Senator Coleman expressed reservations about supporting CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement) unless the interests of the domestic U.S. sugar industry (including Minnesota's sugar beet industry) were accommodated. [8] He settled for quotas imposed on foreign sugar until 2008, and voted in favor of CAFTA on July 1, 2005. He stood behind President Bush on August 2, 2005, as the trade agreement was signed into law.

Coleman became the lead Senate Republican defender of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and the allegations of him illegally leaking the name of a covert CIA operative. Karl Rove reportedly convinced Coleman to seek a Senate seat in 2002 instead of running again for governor. In December 2005 he voted for a budget bill that cut funding from a number of programs, but kept funding for sugar beet farmers in Minnesota after Rove arranged the change. Coleman told Congress Daily that he wouldn't vote for a bill that cut sugarbeet funding but "Karl Rove called me and asked what I wanted. A few hours later it was out of the bill." [9]

Senator Coleman is a member of The Republican Main Street Partnership and supports stem cell research.

On December 21, 2005, he voted to end debate on a defense appropriations bill that included oil exploitation of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) after having pledged in 2002 to oppose such drilling. Coleman stated that he planned to support a procedural challenge to the ANWR provision in a subsequent vote. [10]

On January 30th, 2006, it was reported by the Associated Press that Norm Coleman's staff had been actively editing his (this) entry on Wikipedia, removing critical references to his voting record and revising the description of his former political leanings. Also, this entry appeared on CNN on February 1, 2006 regarding this same issue. [11] [12]

Electoral History

• 2002 Race for U.S. Senate
  • Norm Coleman (R), 49.53%
  • Walter Mondale (DFL), 47.34%

• 1998 Race for Governor
  • Jesse Ventura (Ref.), 37%
  • Norm Coleman (R), 34%
  • Hubert H. Humphrey III (DFL), 28%

• 1997 Race for Mayor (St. Paul, MN)
  • Norm Coleman (R) (inc.), 59%
  • Sandy Pappas (DFL), 41%

• 1993 Race for Mayor (St. Paul, MN)
  • Norm Coleman (DFL), 55%
  • Andy Dawkins (DFL), 44%

External links

• U.S. Senate Website
• Campaign Website
• Norm Coleman on the Issues
• Coleman Staff Makes Changes To Wikipedia Bio