Congrautlations to Rep. John Dingell

Congratulations to Rep. John Dingell who has become the longest-serving member of Congress ever!

 

http://www.freep.com/article/20130607/NEWS06/306070013/John-Dingell-Congress-record-history

 

WASHINGTON — A lunch with ex-staffers, dinner with a few family friends — an otherwise quiet Friday on Capitol Hill.

That’s
how John David Dingell Jr. plans to celebrate day 20,997 on the job as a
congressman: low key. It belies the fact that, as of 12:01 this
morning, the Dearborn Democrat officially became the longest-serving member of Congress ever.

Midnight
did come with at least one high-placed attaboy — from President Barack
Obama, who said “John has always worked tirelessly for people”
helping
to “pass some of the most important laws of the last half-century, from
Medicare to the Civil Rights Act to the Clean Air Act to the Affordable
Care Act.”

Related:
U.S. Rep. John David Dingell Jr., a brief biography | Interview with Dingell: 'I've got a lot of things I want to do' | Some choice Dingell moments | Expect a shower of tributes for Dingell | Stephen Henderson: John Dingell’s list of accomplishments as long as his career

Dingell, 86, beat the record previously held by the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia.
If nothing else, Dingell — whose service dates back to before Alaska
and Hawaii were states — will be happy that the record rests again with a
House member instead of in the Senate.

He’s always been a House man, after all.

For the record, Dingell’s got no plans on leaving, though he hasn’t yet committed to a 30th full 2-year term either. He’s been on the job since Dec. 13, 1955, after being elected to replace his dad.

Congress
being Congress, the House is out of session today, meaning there won’t
be any lengthy floor statements or speeches. House Speaker John Boehner
and other congressional leaders will hold a fete in Dingell’s honor on Thursday, in National Statuary Hall in the Capitol.

Meanwhile,
the week has been a typical one in many ways: He worked to collect
signatures on a letter calling for tough restrictions on currency
manipulation in the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership. In a
subcommittee meeting, he chided Republican chairman John Shimkus of
Illinois for introducing a coal ash bill Dingell called “a prodigious
waste of time.”

“On this historic week being lectured by you is a true honor,” Shimkus told Dingell with a smile.

On
Thursday, Vice President Joe Biden stopped by Dingell’s office to chat,
bringing a clock as a gift. It was lost on no one that when Biden began
his own 36 years of service in the Senate, in 1973, Dingell had already
been in the House for 18 years.

Today, Dingell will cap a week
during which he has been on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and Comedy Central’s
“The Colbert Report”
by taking part in a forum being thrown by the
Atlantic
before heading to the luncheon thrown by ex-staffers in the
Energy and Commerce Committee room, where he long served as chairman.  And this tribute from CNN's State of the Nation, and ABC's This Week.

Then,
said his wife Debbie, it’s a quiet dinner with a few friends — she
won’t say who but one’s a former U.S. secretary of state — before they
head back to Michigan for the weekend on Saturday.

Contact TODD SPANGLER: 703-854-8947 or tspangler@freepress.com