We were saddened to learn that Tom Lantos, the veteran San Mateo congressman serving California’s 12th District, now faces a battle with esophageal cancer and will not run for a 15th term. He is one of Israel’s most ardent champions in Congress, and will not easily be replaced.
First elected to the House of Representatives in 1980, the Budapest-born Lantos is the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress.
Lantos was 16 when Germany invaded Hungary. As a teenager he belonged to the anti-Nazi underground and, later, the nascent anti-communist movement in his country.
In 1947, he immigrated to the United States. He earned a master’s in economics from the University of Washington in Seattle and a Ph.D. in economics from U.C. Berkeley.
For 30 years, he taught economics and served as a business consultant before running for Congress. On issues ranging from the environment to human rights to energy and education, Lantos has been a champion of progressive values and economic justice.
As Haddar Susskind, the Washington, D.C.-based director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, put it, “[Lantos] has long been considered the voice of conscience there.”
Early in his political career, he founded the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, and still serves as co-chair. As a human rights campaigner, he spoke up for the world’s weak and oppressed.
Soviet Jews in the 1980s, Darfurian refugees, former Asian sex slaves, Burmese peace activists — all had a staunch ally in Tom Lantos.
But it is in his role as ranking member and chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee that we most vigorously applaud him. Because he understands the stakes as few House members can, Lantos has worked tirelessly for Israel and has fought anti-Semitism wherever it reared its ugly head.
Lantos was the driving force behind the Global Anti-Semitism Awareness Act of 2004, which required the U.S. Department of State to institute a permanent anti-Semitism watchdog bureau.
San Mateo and the entire Bay Area have been well represented by Tom Lantos over the years, and we will miss his strong voice in government.
Our sincerest wishes for a speedy recovery go out to Tom Lantos. We hope that Lantos, his wife, Annette, and the rest of their family gain strength through this ordeal.
We offer our gratitude to Rep. Tom Lantos for his many years of service to his district, his nation and to the Jewish people.