Veteran GOP lawmaker was dubbed Dean of the House
JUNEAU, Alaska — Alaska Rep. Don Young, who was the longest-serving Republican in the history of the U.S. House, has died. He was 88.
His office announced Young’s death in a statement Friday night.
“It’s with heavy hearts and deep sadness that we announce Congressman Don Young, the Dean of the House and revered champion for Alaska, passed away today while traveling home to Alaska to be with the state and people that he loved,” said the statement from Young’s congressional office.
A cause of death was not provided.
Born on June 9, 1933, in Meridian, California, Young grew up on a family farm. He earned a bachelor’s degree in teaching at the former Chico State College. He also served in the U.S. Army, according to his official biography.
Young came to Alaska in 1959, the year it achieved statehood. He was elected mayor of Fort Yukon in 1964 and elected to the state House two years later. He served two terms before winning election to the state Senate, where, he said, he was miserable.
In 1972, Young was the Republican challenger to Democratic U.S. Rep. Nick Begich. Three weeks before the election, Begich’s plane disappeared on a flight from Anchorage to Juneau. Alaskans reelected Begich anyway.
Begich was declared dead in December 1972, and Young won a close special election in March 1973 and held the seat until his death.
In 2013, Young became the longest-serving member of Alaska’s congressional delegation, surpassing the
late U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, who served for 40 years.
“Everybody knows Don Young,” he said in 2016. “They may not like Don Young; they may love Don Young. But they all know Don Young.”
The often gruff Young had a sense of humor and a camaraderie with colleagues from both sides of the aisle.
As the House member with the longest service, Young swore in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, when the 117th Congress convened on Jan. 3, 2021. Before administering the oath of office, Young expressed dismay about the period’s intense partisanship.
“When you do have a problem or if there’s something so contentious, let’s sit down and have a drink, and solve those problems,” he said, drawing laughter and applause.
Young, known for decades of steering federal spending to his home state, won $23.7 million for Alaska projects in the government-wide $1.5 trillion spending bill President Joe Biden signed into law
last week, according to an analysis by The Associated Press.
His career was marred by investigations and criticism about his off-the-cuff and often abrasive style.
In 2008, Congress asked the Justice Department to investigate Young’s role in securing a $10 million earmark to widen a Florida highway; the matter was dropped in 2010, and Young denied any wrongdoing.
In 2014, the ethics committee found that Young had violated House rules by using campaign funds for personal trips and accepting improper gifts. Young was told to repay the value of the trips and gifts, totaling about $59,000, and amend financial disclosure statements to include gifts he hadn’t reported.
Fresh off a reelection win in 2020, Young announced he had tested positive for COVID-19, months after he had referred to the coronavirus as the “beer virus” before an audience that included older Alaskans and said the media had contributed to hysteria over COVID-19. He later called COVID-19, for which he had been hospitalized, serious.