# Bob Dole Bob Dole (1923–2021) was a Kansas Republican who served in the U.S. Senate from 1969 to 1996 (the longest Republican Senate tenure to that point), was Senate Majority Leader twice (1985-1987 and 1995-1996), was [[Gerald Ford]]'s running mate in [[1976 Presidential Election]], and was the 1996 Republican presidential nominee who lost to incumbent [[Bill Clinton]]. He was a World War II combat infantry lieutenant — seriously wounded in April 1945 in the Italian campaign, with shrapnel damage to his right arm that left him with permanent disability he managed by carrying a pen in his right hand throughout his post-war public life to discourage handshake attempts. His Senate career — across 27 years and four different Republican presidents (Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush 41, plus the early Clinton-era Republican congressional majority) — established him as one of the most operationally effective Senate Republicans of the late 20th century. As Majority Leader 1985-1987 he managed the Iran-Contra-era Senate Republican response; as Majority Leader 1995-1996 he led the Republican Senate during the [[Gingrich Revolution]] period, then resigned from the Senate in June 1996 to focus on the presidential campaign. He lost the 1996 general election 379-159 EV, 49.2% to 40.7% in the popular vote, with [[Ross Perot]] drawing 8.4% under the Reform Party banner. His post-defeat life: a Pepsi advertisement appearance, a Viagra advertisement appearance, sustained work on WWII memorial fundraising and veterans' affairs. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Clinton in 1997 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2018. He died in December 2021 at age 98. ## Right-wing relevance Dole's right-wing significance is principally as a transitional figure between the Reagan-era Republican Party and the post-1994 Gingrich-era one — the last major Republican presidential nominee who was operationally a creature of the pre-movement-conservative party establishment. His 1996 loss substantially exhausted that establishment's electoral viability; the Bush 43 nomination in 2000 came from the same establishment but represented a more thoroughly movement-conservative identity. The contemporary right rarely invokes Dole by name; the structural significance is that he is one of the last figures of a Republican Party tradition the post-2016 Trump movement has substantially displaced. ## Connections - [[Bill Clinton]] — Defeated Dole 1996. - [[Gerald Ford]] — Running mate 1976. - [[George H.W. Bush]] — Bush-Dole 1988 primary rivalry; subsequent cooperation. - [[Newt Gingrich]] — House Speaker 1995-1999 during Dole's Majority Leader period; the Senate-House dynamic that produced the 1995-1996 government shutdowns. ## See also - [[1996 Presidential Election]] — Dole's loss. ---