1. Norm Coleman challenged incumbent Democratic Senator Paul Wellstone in the 2002 United States Senate election in Minnesota.
81 Facts About Norm Coleman
1. 2.
Norm Coleman's family is Jewish, his paternal grandfather having changed the surname from Goldman to Coleman.
3.
Norm Coleman was a graduate of James Madison High School in Brooklyn and Hofstra University on Long Island.
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In college, Norm Coleman was an active member of the 1960s counterculture and a liberal Democrat.
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Norm Coleman celebrated his 20th birthday at the Woodstock Festival, and later admitted to smoking marijuana in his youth.
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Norm Coleman worked as a roadie for Jethro Tull and Ten Years After, among others.
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Norm Coleman attended Brooklyn Law School from 1972 until 1974 but received his Juris Doctor from the University of Iowa College of Law in 1976.
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Norm Coleman joined the Republican Party in 1996 and was reelected mayor of St Paul in 1997, defeating Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party nominee State Senator Sandy Pappas.
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Norm Coleman is, as of 2024, the last Republican mayor of St Paul.
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Norm Coleman easily won the Republican nomination, facing just token opposition in the primary.
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Norm Coleman had served as Wellstone's campaign chair in 1996, shortly before his decision to switch to the Republican Party.
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Norm Coleman defeated Mondale by just over 61,000 votes out of over 2 million cast.
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Norm Coleman succeeded Dean Barkley, whom Ventura had appointed to serve the remaining two months of Wellstone's term.
14.
On December 24,2008, Norm Coleman's lawyers said it was a "virtual certainty" that he would contest the results of the election.
15.
The Franken campaign had tried to limit Norm Coleman to bringing evidence on only the 650 absentee ballots cited in the initial court filing.
16.
Franken got an additional 198 votes, Norm Coleman gained 111, and other candidates received 42, increasing Franken's lead to 312 votes.
17.
The panel ruled that Norm Coleman had failed to prove that mistakes or irregularities in the treatment of absentee ballots had changed the election's outcome.
18.
McKim's petition covered several issues, of which the Norm Coleman matter was only one.
19.
Norm Coleman was not charged with any crime regarding allegations of corruption in receiving gifts of $100,000 from Kazeminy.
20.
Norm Coleman responded with a campaign ad in which he denied the allegations and blamed them on Franken.
21.
Norm Coleman concluded that there was no wrongdoing or impropriety by the Colemans or Kazeminy.
22.
McKim's allegations were repeated hundreds of times in local and national media reports during the waning days of the 2008 election in what Norm Coleman called "multi-million-dollar attacks against my family and Nasser Kazeminy".
23.
Norm Coleman concluded that McKim had a clear motive to use false allegations as leverage to enrich himself.
24.
In January 2009, Norm Coleman became an adviser to and board member of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
25.
In 2010, Norm Coleman became chairman and CEO of the American Action Network, which he co-founded.
26.
Norm Coleman was considered a front-runner for the position of chair of the Republican National Committee in 2010 in the event that incumbent Michael Steele did not seek reelection.
27.
Norm Coleman said he would not run for the chairmanship if Steele ran for reelection, and did not after Steele announced his candidacy.
28.
In 2013, Norm Coleman confirmed he would not challenge Franken in the 2014 Senate election.
29.
Norm Coleman declined to run against Governor Mark Dayton in the 2014 gubernatorial election.
30.
Norm Coleman stepped down as leader of the Government Relations and Public Affairs practice at Hogan Lovells in January 2020, but remains a senior counsel.
31.
Norm Coleman is on the National Advisory Council for the US Global Leadership Coalition, a bipartisan committee that promotes international engagement and includes every living former US secretary of state.
32.
In college Norm Coleman was a liberal Democrat and actively involved in the antiwar movement of the early 1970s; he was once suspended for leading a sit-in protest.
33.
In December 1996, Norm Coleman announced he was leaving the DFL to join the Republican Party.
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Norm Coleman cited his frustrations with the Democratic Party and his belief that the Republican Party offered the best chance to continue his efforts to hold the line on taxes and grow jobs.
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Norm Coleman was a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership.
36.
In September 2008, Norm Coleman joined the bipartisan Gang of 20, which was seeking a solution to the American energy crisis.
37.
Norm Coleman was a strong supporter of bipartisan efforts to create American independence from foreign sources of energy.
38.
In 2005, Norm Coleman led a bipartisan coalition of 34 senators in securing a renewable fuels package as part of the 2005 Energy Policy Act, which included new standards for renewable fuels and an extension of tax credits for biodiesel, small ethanol producers and wind and livestock waste.
39.
Norm Coleman supported additional oil exploration in the outer continental shelf, but maintained a campaign promise to oppose drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
40.
On December 11,2005, Norm Coleman voted to invoke cloture on, thus advancing, a defense appropriations bill that included oil exploration in ANWR.
41.
Norm Coleman said he did so because although he planned to vote against the bill, he did not believe that a filibuster was warranted.
42.
Norm Coleman was praised for his efforts to improve the bill's provisions with regard to sugar, a mainstay of northwestern Minnesota's economy, as well as the bill's dairy program.
43.
Norm Coleman worked for the inclusion of a permanent agriculture disaster assistance program and hailed the bill's investments in conservation, nutrition, and renewable energy.
44.
Norm Coleman twice voted to override President Bush's veto of the Farm Bill.
45.
Norm Coleman expressed reservations about supporting DR-CAFTA unless the interests of the domestic US sugar industry were accommodated.
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Norm Coleman voted in favor of DR-CAFTA after obtaining quotas imposed on foreign sugar until 2008.
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Norm Coleman stood behind Bush on August 2,2005, as the trade agreement was signed into law.
48.
Norm Coleman was generally regarded as a fiscal centrist who supported increasing the minimum wage and safeguarding pensions while at the same time supporting broad tax relief and the line-item veto.
49.
Norm Coleman played an important role in the passage of the Pension Protection Act of 2006.
50.
Norm Coleman consistently voted to increase the minimum wage as senator.
51.
Norm Coleman had a consistent record of voting for broad tax reform.
52.
Norm Coleman supported reductions to the capital gains tax and the marriage penalty, and supported doubling the child tax credit.
53.
Norm Coleman supported efforts to make permanent the tax cuts enacted by the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 and the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003.
54.
Norm Coleman was a strong supporter of the Iraq War from the start.
55.
Norm Coleman was in favor of the eventual removal of US troops from Iraq, but did not support any kind of timetable for their removal until the situation stabilized.
56.
Norm Coleman was outspoken about the threat Iran poses to Western democracies.
57.
Norm Coleman sponsored numerous Congressional Resolutions aimed at Iran, including measures condemning its violations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and other international obligations.
58.
Norm Coleman led an effort to bring worldwide pressure on Iran to stop its attempts to enrich uranium, which many believed was the final step in an effort to gain offensive nuclear weapons capabilities.
59.
Norm Coleman co-sponsored several pieces of legislation to increase sanctions on Iran, including divestment of American pension funds in companies that do business with Iran and sanctions against countries that provide it with nuclear technology.
60.
Norm Coleman cosponsored the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2006 and sent then Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice a letter urging her to investigate Egypt's smuggling of arms to Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip.
61.
Norm Coleman was a strong supporter of Bush's 2006 and 2007 attempts to pass comprehensive immigration reform in the Senate, one of the few Republicans to do so, as many called it "amnesty for illegal aliens".
62.
Norm Coleman admitted to using marijuana as a youth, and he advocated its legalization while in college.
63.
Norm Coleman has said that maturity led him to understand that his drug use was dangerous and has repeatedly stated his opposition to legalized drugs, including marijuana.
64.
Norm Coleman has campaigned as an anti-abortion candidate since at least 1993.
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Norm Coleman supports limiting stem cell research to adult stem cells and stem cells derived from umbilical cord blood, and in July 2006 voted against lifting restrictions on federal research dollars for new embryonic stem cell lines.
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Norm Coleman is a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership, which supports embryonic stem cell research.
67.
Norm Coleman voted in favor of legislative intervention to prolong the life of severely brain-damaged Floridian Terri Schiavo.
68.
Norm Coleman opposed recognition of same-sex marriages by either the federal or state governments.
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Norm Coleman supported allowing workers to divert a portion of their Social Security contributions to the creation of individual accounts to be invested in the stock market, a variation of a general plan supporters call "personal accounts," historically known as privatization.
70.
Norm Coleman agreed with Bush's statements that the contribution changes would apply to those younger than 55.
71.
In 2002, the Bush administration persuaded Norm Coleman to run against Wellstone rather than for governor.
72.
In December 2005, Norm Coleman voted for a budget bill that cut funding from a number of programs but kept funding for sugar beet farmers in Minnesota after Rove asked him to support the administration's position on the issue.
73.
Norm Coleman worked to root out corruption at the United Nations, targeting the so-called "oil-for-food" program.
74.
In May 2005, the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, chaired by Norm Coleman, held hearings on abuses of the UN Oil-for-Food program, including oil smuggling, illegal kickbacks and use of surcharges, and Saddam Hussein's use of oil vouchers to buy influence abroad.
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The previous year, Norm Coleman had called on UN Secretary-general Kofi Annan to resign for other alleged program abuses.
76.
On June 2,2006, Norm Coleman responded to criticism that he had insufficiently investigated the Australian Wheat Board for sanctions busting, saying that there were legal and cost hurdles.
77.
On March 14,2006, Norm Coleman introduced a bill that would ban foreign companies from operating ports in the United States.
78.
Shortly after he filed the legislation, Norm Coleman received a generous contribution from the CEO of Carlson Companies, which owns Carlson Wagonlit Travel, a business travel management firm whose CW Government Travel unit provides travel management services for some federal agencies.
79.
In 2016, Jacob Norm Coleman announced his candidacy for an open Minnesota Senate seat held by Julianne Ortman, but did not win the Republican endorsement.
80.
Norm Coleman is a member of the Freemason fraternity, having been made a Mason at sight in 2003 by then Grand Master of Masons in Minnesota Neil Neddermeyer.
81.
On September 11,2009, Norm Coleman announced he had been diagnosed with Bell's palsy.