Born as Lantos Tamás Péter (pronounced
['lɒntoʃ 'tɒmaːʃ 'peːtɛr]) to a
Jewish family in
Budapest,
Hungary, Lantos was part of a
resistance movement against the
Nazis during the
German occupation of Hungary. In his floor speeches, he sometimes referred to himself as one of the few living members of Congress who had fought against
fascism.
He sought refuge in a safe house established by
Raoul Wallenberg; in 1981 Lantos sponsored a bill making Wallenberg an
Honorary Citizen of the United States. He moved to the United States in 1947, and though he became fluent in English, he retained a marked
Hungarian accent for the rest of his life.
Lantos considered himself a
secular Jew[1] . Upon
immigrating to the United States under the auspices of
Hillel he attended the
University of Washington and the
University of California, Berkeley, receiving his
Ph.D in 1953.
From 1950 to 1980, Lantos was a professor of
economics, an
international affairs analyst for
public television, and a
consultant to a number of businesses. He also served as a senior advisor to several
U.S. Senators.
Lantos made his first run for office in 1980, when he defeated one-term
Republican congressman
Bill Royer by 5,700 votes. He never faced another contest nearly that close, and was reelected 13 times. He was the only
Holocaust survivor ever to serve in Congress.
[5]Lantos and his wife Annette have two daughters, Annette and
Katrina, and 17 grandchildren. Lantos' wife is a member of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints[6] and a first cousin of the sisters
Zsa Zsa,
Eva, and
Magda Gabor.
[7]His daughter Katrina, who married
ambassador and former U.S. Representative from
New Hampshire Richard Swett, was a candidate for Congress in New Hampshire, running for the House of Representatives in 2002 against
Charlie Bass and in 2008 for the U.S. Senate against
John E. Sununu. His daughter Annette was married to Timber Dick, "an independent businessman in Colorado,"
[8] until Dick's death on April 10, 2008 from burns suffered in an automobile accident.
[9][10]Lantos appeared in the
Academy Award-winning film The Last Days, a documentary of the Holocaust's effect on Hungarian Jews, and "To Bear Witness", another documentary.
[11]Lantos often brought a small white terrier named Mackó (pronounced
[mɒtskoː]; "little bear" in Hungarian) to his Capitol Hill office. Lantos' previous dog, a small poodle named Gigi, was also a fixture in Washington.
Tom Lantos was an honorary member of the
International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation.
Lantos was a strong supporter of the
Iraq War from the start, but from 2006 onward made increasingly critical statements about the conduct of the war, and as the
chairman of the
United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs he held 20 oversight hearings on the war in 2007. (See separate section below about the war in Iraq.)
Lantos was a member of the
Congressional Progressive Caucus[12] and repeatedly called for reforms to the nation's
health-care system, reduction of the
national budget deficit and the
national debt, repeal of the
Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001, and has opposed
Social Security privatization efforts. He supported
same-sex marriage rights and
marijuana for medical use, was a strong proponent of
gun control[13] and was adamantly
pro-choice.
[14]Lantos was a well-known advocate on behalf of the
environment, receiving consistently high ratings from the
League of Conservation Voters and other
environmental organizations for his legislative record.
[15] His long-standing efforts to protect open space brought thousands of acres under the protection of the
Golden Gate National Recreation Area, including Mori Point, Sweeney Ridge and — most recently — Rancho Corral de Tierra, which will keep its watersheds and delicate habitats free from development permanently.
[16][17] In 2005 he opposed an effort to expand public use of the
Farallon Islands, a protected wildlife haven.
Lantos consistently championed local
transportation projects that need federal funds and, given his seniority in Congress, proved successful at delivering this support.
Lantos was also involved in various
human rights causes, such as having
Yahoo CEO
Jerry Yang testify at a congressional hearing, when the company turned over the email records of two Chinese dissidents to the Chinese government, allowing them to be traced and one sentenced to jail.
Lantos served as the chairman of the
United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Through its more than 20 years of work, the Congressional Human Rights Caucus
[18] — of which Lantos was co-chair with Representative
Frank Wolf — has covered a wide range of human rights issues, including speaking for Christians in
Saudi Arabia and
Sudan to practice their faith, helping
Tibetans to retain their culture and religion in Tibet, and advocating for other minorities worldwide. Lantos’ efforts to protect religious freedom in 2004 resulted in a bill to attempt to stop the spread of
anti-semitism.
[19]Lantos was involved with his colleagues on the International Relations Committee on many decisions that affect other aspects of
American foreign policy. Lantos spoke out against waste, fraud and abuse in the multi-billion dollar U.S. reconstruction program in Iraq, and has warned that the U.S. may lose Afghanistan to the
Taliban if the
Bush Administration fails to take decisive action to halt the current decline in political stability there.
Lantos, as the ranking Democrat on the International Relations Committee, tried to disrupt U.S. military aid to
Egypt, argued that the Egyptian military had made insufficient efforts to stop the flow of money and weapons across the Egyptian border to
Hamas in
Gaza, and had not contributed troops to internationally-supported peacekeeping efforts in
Afghanistan and elsewhere. Lantos was a strong advocate of
Israel.
Lantos was a strong supporter of the 1991
Persian Gulf War. During the run-up to the war, the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, of which Lantos was co-chairman, hosted a young
Kuwaiti woman identified only as "
Nurse Nayirah", who told of horrific abuses by Iraqi soldiers, including the killing of Kuwaiti babies by taking them out of their incubators and leaving them to die on the cold floor of the hospital. These alleged atrocities figured prominently in the rhetoric at the time about Iraqi abuses in Kuwait.
The girl's account was later challenged by independent human rights monitors.
[20] "Nurse Nayirah" later turned out to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States.
[20] Asked about his having allowed the girl to give testimony without identifying herself, and without her story having been corroborated, Lantos replied, "The notion that any of the witnesses brought to the caucus through the Kuwaiti Embassy would not be credible did not cross my mind... I have no basis for assuming that her story is not true, but the point goes beyond that. If one hypothesizes that the woman's story is fictitious from A to Z, that in no way diminishes the avalanche of human rights violations."
[20]Lantos and
John R. MacArthur, the foremost critic of the Nayirah issue, each had op-eds features in The New York Times, in which each accused the other of distortion.
[21] MacArthur suggested that Lantos may have materially benefited from his having accommodated Nayirah.
[22] Nayirah was later revealed to have connections to a lobbying firm in the employ of a
Kuwaiti activist group, and her story has since come to be regarded as baseless propaganda.
On October 4, 2002, Lantos led a narrow majority of Democrats on the House International Relations Committee to a successful vote in support of the Resolution for the Use of Force, seeking the approval of the United Nations and under the condition that Bush would allow UN weapons inspectors to finish their work and that Bush would need to return to Congress for an actual declaration of war before invading Iraq. The resolution later passed the House and the Senate with a total of 373 members of Congress supporting it. "The train is now on its way," said Lantos after his — and the President's — victory.
[23] In later hearings on the war, Lantos continued his enthusiastic support. At one point he was confronted by witnesses who questioned the likelihood of enthusiastic Baghdadis welcoming the invading Americans; Lantos called this a kind of racism, to suggest the Iraqis might be so ungrateful.
Starting in early 2006, Lantos has distanced himself from the Bush Administration's Iraq policy, making critical statements at hearings, on the House floor and in published media interviews about the conduct of the war. During hearings of the House International Relations Committee, where he was then the ranking member, Lantos repeatedly praised the investigative work of the office of the Special Inspector of Iraq Reconstruction General Stuart Bowen, which uncovered evidence of waste, fraud and abuse in the use of U.S. taxpayer dollars intended to help secure and rebuild Iraq.
Lantos was an immediate and consistent critic of the troop surge advocated by President Bush. On the night in January 2007 that Bush announced his plan, Lantos responded, "I oppose the so-called surge that constitutes the centerpiece of the President's plan. Our efforts in Iraq are a mess, and throwing in more troops will not improve it." And during a joint House hearing on September 10, 2007 featuring General
David Petraeus and Ambassador
Ryan Crocker, Lantos said, "The Administration’s myopic policies in Iraq have created a fiasco. Is it any wonder that on the subject of Iraq, more and more Americans have little confidence in this Administration? We can not take ANY of this Administration's assertions on Iraq at face value anymore, and no amount of charts or statistics will improve its credibility. This is not a knock on you, General Petraeus, or on you, Ambassador Crocker. But the fact remains, gentlemen, that the Administration has sent you here today to convince the members of these two Committees and the Congress that victory is at hand. With all due respect to you, I must say … I don't buy it." At the same hearing, Lantos drew comparisons between some of the current U.S. activities in Iraq to U.S. support two decades ago of Islamic militants in Afghanistan: "America should not be in the business of arming, training and funding both sides of a religious civil war in Iraq. Did the Administration learn nothing from our country’s actions in Afghanistan two decades ago, when by supporting Islamist militants against the Soviet Union, we helped pave the way for the rise of the Taliban? Why are we now repeating the short-sighted patterns of the past?"
Tom Lantos stood up for the rights of
Hungarian minorities several times
[26][27] as a member of the US House of Representatives. In a 2007 letter he asked
Robert Fico, the Prime Minister of Slovakia to distance themselves from the
Benes decrees, a reasonable process in the
Hedvig Malina case, and to treat members of the
Hungarian minority as equal
[28][29]. He indirectly blamed the Slovak government for ethnically motivated attacks on Hungarians because the country's governing coalition included ultra-nationalist parties
[30].
The American Hungarian Federation recognized Congressman Lantos for his "Leadership in Support of Democracy, Human Rights and Minority Rights in Central and Eastern Europe,” awarding him the organization's highest award the "Col. Commandant Michael Kovats Medal of Freedom" at the October 19, 2005 Congressional Reception commemorating the 49th Anniversary of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution.
On January 2, 2008, Lantos announced he would not run for a 15th term in the House due to being diagnosed with esophageal cancer, but planned to complete his final term. Lantos was quoted as saying, "It is only in the United States that a penniless survivor of the Holocaust and a fighter in the anti-Nazi underground could have received an education, raised a family, and had the privilege of serving the last three decades of his life as a Member of Congress. I will never be able to express fully my profoundly felt gratitude to this great country."
[32][33] Lantos died on February 11, 2008, of complications from esophageal cancer before finishing his term. A
special election was held to fill his seat on April 8, 2008 and was won by former
State Senator Jackie Speier who Lantos had endorsed as his successor.
[34].
Shortly after his death,
Roy Blunt, the House Republican Whip stated that "Chairman Lantos will be remembered as a man of uncommon integrity and sincere moral conviction -- and a public servant who never wavered in his pursuit of a better, freer and more religiously tolerant world."
[35]A memorial service was held for Lantos on February 14, 2008 at Statuary Hall in the Capitol. Attendants included Senator
Joe Biden,
Bono of
U2, Rep.
Steny Hoyer, UN Secretary General
Ban Ki-moon, Israeli foreign minister
Tzipi Livni, Speaker
Nancy Pelosi, Secretary
Condoleezza Rice, Rep.
Christopher Shays, and
Elie Wiesel.
[2]On June 19, 2008, President
George W. Bush posthumously awarded Lantos the Medal of Freedom. In a ceremony at the White House, Bush stated "We miss his vigorous defense of human rights and his powerful witness for the cause of human freedom. For a lifetime of leadership, for his commitment to liberty, and for his devoted service to his adopted nation, I am proud to award the Presidential Medal of Freedom, posthumously, to Tom Lantos, and proud that his loving wife Annette will receive the award on behalf of his family."
Tom Lantos (Lantos Péter Tamás (
Budapest,
1928.
február 1. –
2008.
február 11.)
[1] magyar származású
amerikai demokrata párti politikus,
1981-től haláláig az amerikai képviselőház tagja, ahol
Kalifornia 12. számú választókerületét képviselte, a ház egyedüli
holokauszt-túlélőjeként.
2008.
január 2-án bejelentette, hogy
nyelőcsőrákja miatt az év végén visszavonul a politikától,
[2] azonban ezt nem érhette meg mivel
február 11-én 80 évesen elhunyt.
A képviselő hivatalos honlapján
[4] található életrajza szerint Lantos már fiatalon a demokrácia ügyéért harcolt, Magyarország
1944-es
német megszállása idején tizenévesként
antifasiszta, a
II. világháború után pedig
antikommunista diákmozgalmakban vett részt.
1947-től az Egyesült Államokban él, ahol felsőfokú tanulmányokat folytatott a Washingtoni Egyetemen, illetve a kaliforniai Berkeley Egyetemen, ahol
1953-ban
PhD-fokozatot szerzett. Mielőtt képviselő lett, volt egyetemi közgazdaságtan-professzor, üzleti tanácsadó magántársaságoknál, külpolitikai elemző egy televízió-társaságnál, majd a
szenátus gazdaság-, illetve külpolitikai tanácsadója.
Az USA képviselőház megemlékezése beszámol arról, hogy Tom Lantos, a Külügyek Bizottságának elnöke, 14 terminuson keresztül volt képviselő, és kiemeli, hogy egész felnőtt élete során igyekezett felemelni hangját az emberi jogok és a polgári szabadság érdekében.
[5]Felesége, Annette, a San Francisco Chronicle című amerikai napilap szerint
Gábor Zsa Zsa magyar származású amerikai színésznő unokatestvére.
[6] 58 évig voltak partnerek mind a kongresszusban, mind a házasságban.
[5] Neje és két lánya
Az Utolsó Napok Szentjeinek Jézus Krisztus Egyháza nevű
mormon egyház tagjai lettek.
[7]A magyar miniszterelnök ki akarta tüntetni a Magyar Köztársasági Érdemrend Nagykeresztjével, de betegsége miatt a kitüntetést már nem vehette át
[8], és nem sokkal később elhunyt.
Politikai nézetei alapján Lantost liberális kongresszusi képviselőnek tekintették:
[9] [10]Az emberi jogok védelmét központi jelentőségű politikai feladatként tűzte ki.
Támogatta a terhességmegszakítás legalizálását és az őssejtkutatást.
Felszólalt a
Patriot Act (kb. hazafias törvény) törvénybeiktatása ellen.
Támogatta a szexuális kisebbségek jogait, beleértve jogukat a házasságkötésre és gyermekek örökbefogadására.
Felszólalt a halálbüntetés ellen.
Felszólalt a könnyebb kábítószerek orvosi célú felhasználásának engedélyezése mellett.
Felszólalt a fegyverviselési jog korlátozása mellett.
San Franciscóban választották meg képviselőnek
1980-ban. Washingtonban első dolga az volt, hogy törvényjavaslatot terjesztett elő arról, hogy
Raoul Wallenbergnek adják meg a tiszteletbeli amerikai állampolgárságot és követeljék a
Szovjetuniótól az
1945-ben elrabolt svéd diplomata sorsának őszinte feltárását. Elérte azt is, hogy Washingtonban, a Capitolium alatti rotondában állítsák fel Wallenberg mellszobrát. S elérte azt is, hogy a magyar szabadság vezetőjének
Kossuth Lajosnak is szobrot állítsanak a Capitoliumban, Kossuth Lajos e szobrának avatása
1990.
március 15-én volt, az ünnepségre meghívták
Tőkés László erdélyi református püspököt is.
[11]1990.
október 10-én,
Kuvait iraki megszállása után Tom Lantos egy 15 éves kuvaiti lányt vezetett az akkoriban általa elnökölt emberi jogokkal foglalkozó kongresszusi csoport elé. Azt lehetett csak tudni róla, hogy a neve Najira, és azt állította, szemtanúja volt, amint a megszállt Kuvaitban az al-Addan kórházban, ahol ápolónőként dolgozott,
Szaddám Huszein katonái kitépték a konnektorból az újszülöttekre vigyázó inkubátorok villanyvezetékeit, és 312 csecsemőt otthagytak meghalni. Később kitudódott, Najira nem is menekült, hanem a kuvaiti uralkodócsalád tagja, Szaúd Naszir al-Szabáh washingtoni kuvaiti nagykövet lánya. Az általa előadott történetet az
Amnesty International és más emberjogi megfigyelők is cáfolták. Kiderült az is, hogy Tom Lantos tudott a lány személyazonosságáról, de eltitkolta azt, sőt, Lantoson és a lány családján kívül felkészítette őt a „vallomásra” az a Lauri Fitz-Pegado is, aki a Lantossal szoros üzleti kapcsolatban álló Hill and Knowlton nevű PR cég alelnöke. A kis színjátékra azért volt szükség, hogy a képviselők támogatását megnyerje a tervezett
öbölháborúhoz.
[12]1992-ben jelent meg
Csurka István dolgozata Néhány gondolat címmel, mely azonnal éles viták kereszttüzébe került, bírálói által antiszemitának minősített kijelentései miatt
[13]. Tom Lantos olyan súlyúnak ítélte a csurkai gondolatok következményeit, hogy egyenesen az amerikai kongresszus elé vitte az ügyet, miközben így nyilatkozott: "Naivitásnak tartom azt a nézetet, mely szerint a demokráciában minden nézet egyenlő értékű. … Két héten belül a kezdeményezésemre rendkívüli ülést tartunk képviselőtársaimmal a kongresszusban, amelyen megtárgyaljuk ezt a kérdést. Ennek az ülésnek kifejezetten a Csurka-dolgozat lesz a témája. A munkánkat közvetíteni fogja a televízió az egész országban. … Egyszerűen nem engedhetjük meg, hogy a kormány legnagyobb koalíciós pártjának alelnöke, Csurka úr ilyen nézeteket hangoztasson, anélkül, hogy az Egyesült Államok szenátusa ezt meg ne tárgyalja."
[14]Lantos a
Haaretz izraeli lap szerint az elsők között (már
2002 szeptemberében) szorgalmazta Irak amerikai megtámadását, amikor Colette Avital
izraeli képviselővel folytatott beszélgetésén a következőket mondta: „Kedves Colette,
Szaddammal semmi problémájuk nem lesz. Nemsokára megszabadulunk tőle, és a helyébe ültetünk egy Nyugat-szimpatizáns diktátort, aki nekünk is és Önöknek is jó lesz.”
[15] A képviselő tagadta, hogy ilyet mondott volna, és hangsúlyozta, hogy ő egész életében demokrácia-párti volt.
[16]2007 októberében, miután a szlovák parlament szavazása megerősítette a
Beneš-dekrétumokat, Tom Lantos levélben szólította fel a szlovák miniszterelnököt,
Robert Ficót, hogy "nyilvánosan határolódjon el a Beneš-dekrétumoktól, és törekedjen annak biztosítására, hogy a magyar kisebbség tagjait
Szlovákia egyenrangú állampolgáraiként kezeljék". Levelében arra is kitért, hogy a szlovák igazságszolgáltatás nem képes eljárni a szlovákiai magyar
Malina Hedvig elleni „gyűlölet-bűntény” ügyében.
Jan Fischer (born 2 January 1951) is the Prime Minister of the caretaker government of Czech Republic since 8 May 2009. A lifelong statistician, he was previously the president of the Czech Statistical Office since April 2003.
Jan Fischer (Prága, 1951. január 2. –) politikus, Csehország kijelölt miniszterelnöke 2009. április 9. óta. Ezt megelőzően a Cseh Statisztikai Hivatal elnöke volt 2003-tól.
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