Former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel, who read the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record, died at 91.
SEASIDE, Calif. — Mike Gravel, a former U.S. senator from Alaska who read the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record and confronted Barack Obama about nuclear weapons during a later presidential run, has died. He was 91.
Gravel, who represented Alaska as a Democrat in the Senate from 1969 to 1981, died Saturday, according to his daughter, Lynne Mosier. Gravel had been living in Seaside, California, and was in failing health, said Theodore W. Johnson, a former aide.
Gravel’s two terms came during tumultuous years for Alaska when construction of the trans-alaska oil pipeline was authorized and when Congress was deciding how to settle Alaska Native land claims and whether to classify enormous amounts of federal land as parks, preserves and monuments.
Gravel feuded with Alaska’s other senator, Republican Ted Stevens, on the land matter, preferring to fight President Jimmy Carter’s actions and rejecting Stevens’ advocacy for a compromise.
In the end, Congress passed the
Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980, a compromise that set aside millions of acres for national parks, wildlife refuges and other protected areas.
Gravel’s Senate tenure also was notable for his anti-war activity. In 1971, he led a one-man filibuster to protest the Vietnam-era draft and he read into the Congressional Record 4,100 pages of the 7,000-page leaked document known as the Pentagon Papers, the Defense Department’s history of the country’s early involvement in Vietnam.
Gravel re-entered national politics decades after his time in the Senate to twice run for president.