William Cohen's mother, Clara, was of Protestant Irish ancestry, and his father, Reuben Cohen, was born in New York and was the son of a Russian Jewish immigrant; the two owned the Bangor Rye Bread Co.
30 Facts About William Cohen
2.
Pursuant to his father's wishes, William Cohen was raised Jewish, attended a synagogue, and attended Hebrew School in preparation for his bar mitzvah, but he decided not to follow through with his bar mitzvah when he was informed that he would have to convert formally to Judaism, and he began to practice Christianity.
3.
William Cohen became an assistant county attorney for Penobscot County.
4.
William Cohen served as the vice president of the Maine Trial Lawyers Association and as a member of the Bangor School Board.
5.
William Cohen was reelected in 1984 and 1990, serving a total of 18 years in the Senate.
6.
In 1994 William Cohen investigated the federal government's process for acquiring information technology, and his report, Computer Chaos: Billions Wasted Buying Federal Computer Systems, generated much discussion.
7.
William Cohen chose not to run for another Senate term in 1996; Susan Collins, who had worked for Cohen, was elected to succeed him.
8.
William Cohen voted in favor of the bill establishing Martin Luther King Jr.
9.
William Cohen voted in favor of the nominations of Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas to the US Supreme Court.
10.
William Cohen implicitly criticized the Clinton administration for lacking a clear strategy for leaving Bosnia and stated that he thought US troops should definitely be out by mid-1998.
11.
William Cohen asserted that he would resist further budget cuts, retain the two regional conflicts strategy, and support spending increases for advanced weapons, even if it necessitated further cuts in military personnel.
12.
William Cohen questioned whether savings from base closings and acquisition reform could provide enough money for procurement of new weapons and equipment that the Joint Chiefs of Staff thought necessary in the next few years.
13.
William Cohen supported the expansion of NATO and looked on the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction as the most serious problem the United States faced.
14.
William Cohen then settled into a schedule much fuller than he had followed in the Senate.
15.
William Cohen traveled abroad several times during his first months in office.
16.
William Cohen requested a $250.7 billion budget, which represented 3 percent of the nation's estimated gross domestic product for FY 1998.
17.
When he presented the FY1998 budget, William Cohen noted that he would involve himself with the Quadrennial Defense Review, which would focus on the challenges to US security and the nation's military needs over the next decade or more.
18.
William Cohen stated that the Pentagon would retain the "two regional wars" scenario adopted after the end of the Cold War.
19.
William Cohen recommended two more rounds of base closings in 1999 and 2001.
20.
William Cohen faced the question of the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which he supported and its relationship to Russia.
21.
In December 1999, William Cohen ordered an immediate review of the Clinton administration's controversial "don't ask, don't tell" policy regarding the status and treatment of gays and lesbians in the US military.
22.
William Cohen was presented with the Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service by the Woodrow Wilson Center of the Smithsonian Institution on March 7,2002, in New York City.
23.
William Cohen appears in this capacity on BBC World News America and other broadcasts.
24.
William Cohen serves as an advisory board member for the Partnership for a Secure America and is a member of the ReFormers Caucus of Issue One.
25.
William Cohen endorsed Democratic nominee former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
26.
In July 2022, William Cohen helped found a group of US business and policy leaders who share the goal of constructively engaging with China in order to improve US-China relations.
27.
William Cohen filed for divorce from his first wife, Diana Dunn, on February 15,1987.
28.
William Cohen was known as the "First Lady of the Pentagon" during Cohen's tenure as secretary.
29.
William Cohen served as best man in then-Senate Naval Liaison John McCain's second wedding.
30.
William Cohen was charged in federal court with first-degree murder and was indicted by a federal grand jury on seven counts, including hate-crime charges.