Walter Mondale, Jimmy Carter’s vice president, dead at 93

Mondale was Jimmy Carter’s running mate in 1976, beating Republican incumbent Gerald Ford and Bob Dole. Hamstrung by a weakened U.S. economy and energy crisis, Carter and Mondale lost reelection in 1980 to Reagan and George H.W. Bush. A U.S. senator for Minnesota from 1965 to 1977, he was President Bill Clinton’s ambassador to Japan from 1993 to 1996.

Four years after his single term as vice president, Mondale became the Democratic Party’s nominee against Reagan, narrowly edging out Colorado Sen. Gary Hart. He picked New York congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro to be the first woman vice presidential candidate representing a major political party.

They were trounced, however, winning only Minnesota and Washington, D.C., in a Reagan landslide.

“Today I mourn the passing of my dear friend Walter Mondale, who I consider the best vice president in our country’s history,” Carter said in a statement on Monday.

Some 22 years after last holding elected office, in 2002, Mondale emerged from retirement to run for the U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota vacated by Paul Wellstone, who was killed in a plane crash two weeks before Election Day. He lost narrowly to Norm Coleman in a humiliating defeat.

(Susan Walsh/AP)

In 2019, Mondale described the disappointment of that defeat. “I had a stack of books next to my bed, and I’d read sometimes all night because I couldn’t sleep, and Joan used to get mad at me, and I said, ‘You know, I think this is the best way to do it.’ Then finally, I was only reading half the night and then a third of the night,” Mondale said. “But it took me some time to be normal. I mean, it hurt.”

After the 1984 election, Mondale joined the Dorsey & Whitney law firm in Minneapolis. He also periodically got involved in government in the years that followed.

Mondale wrote a farewell letter sent to his staff over the years upon his death on Monday. “Together we have accomplished so much and I know you will keep up the good fight,” he said, in part, before referring to President Joe Biden, whom he mentored over the years, according to Axios.

“Joe in the White House certainly helps,” he said.

Mondale spoke with Biden over the weekend, the president said in a statement released by the White House.

“It’s with great sadness that Jill and I learned of the passing of Vice President Walter Mondale, but great gratitude that we were able to call one of our nation’s most dedicated patriots and public servants a dear friend and mentor,” Biden said. “Jill and I had the opportunity to speak to Fritz and his family over the weekend, to reflect on the years of friendship we shared, and how much we learned from and leaned on each other.”

Mondale, born in Ceylon, Martin County, Minnesota, on Jan. 5, 1928, was a huge presence in Minnesota politics. He served as attorney general and U.S. senator for the state in the 1960s and 1970s, and after his political career ended, he remained an influential figure in the state until his death.

In recent years, Mondale advised and made appearances with Democrats who would represent Minnesota in the U.S. Senate, including Al Franken, Amy Klobuchar, and Tina Smith. Even before Klobuchar declared her campaign for president in the 2020 race, Mondale announced he expected her to run and, in comparing her chances to his 1984 run, said, “She has got a much better chance of having a better result.”

Mondale underwent successful heart surgery in 2014 and had a stint in a hospital in 2015 after being admitted with influenza.

His wife of 58 years, Joan, died in 2014 at 83. He is survived by two sons, Ted and William, and several grandchildren. Walter and Joan Mondale also had a daughter, Eleanor Mondale Poling, who died of brain cancer at the age of 51 in 2011.

Plans for memorials will be announced at a later date for both Minnesota and Washington, D.C., the Mondale family said on Monday.