Richard Blumenthal is a veteran American politician and current Senator of the United States of Connecticut. Blumenthal is also a lawyer and a graduate of the prestigious Yale Law School. He served as Attorney General of Connecticut from 1991 to 2011. He is a Democrat and has been the state’s top senator since 2013. He is also known as the second wealthiest member of the U.S. Senate.
Richard Blumenthal Bio
Richard Blumenthal was born on February 13, 1946, in Brooklyn, New York. His parents were Jane and Martin Blumenthal. Blumenthal’s father was a Jew who was president of a commodities trading company. He had immigrated to the United States from Frankfurt, Germany, at the age of 17 alone.
Richard attended a private school in the Bronx, Riverdale Country School. He graduated from Harvard College and then went to England and studied for a year at Trinity College, Cambridge. He then went to Yale Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal. While attending Yale Law School, he was a classmate of Bill and Hillary Clinton. Blumenthal has a brother named David Blumenthal who serves as president of the Commonwealth Fund.
After college, Blumenthal became an administrative assistant and legal counsel to many prominent people in Washington, D.C. Blumenthal served in the United States Marine Corps Reserve from 1970 to 1976, where he rose to the rank of sergeant. From 1977 to 1981, he became United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut. Later, in the early 1980s, he worked in a private law firm. Later, from 1985-1987, he served in the Connecticut House of Representatives. In 1990, he was elected Attorney General of Connecticut and served for twenty years.
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After the incumbent Democratic Senator Chris Dodd announced his resignation in 2010, Blumenthal announced his decision to run for the U.S. Senate. Blumenthal and professional wrestling magnate Linda McMahon ran for office in the 2010 elections. He won by a margin of 12 points and 55 percent of the vote. He was sworn in on 5 January 2011.
He took seats on the Senate committees for the Armed Forces, Justice, Aging, and Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. After Joe Lieberman resigned in 2013, he became a senior senator of Connecticut. In 2016, he was the first person to win more than one million votes in a Connecticut national election, after winning re-election with 63.2% of the vote.
Richard Blumenthal Net Worth
Richard Blumenthal, considered the second wealthiest member of the Senate, had an estimated net worth of $70 million. His real estate portfolio accounts for $18 million of his assets. Senator Blumenthal has approximately $6.8 million, most of which is held by JP Morgan Chase.
Education
Blumenthal attended Riverdale Country School in the Riverdale section of the Bronx. After high school, he attended Harvard College, which he graduated magna cum laude with an A.B. degree. At Harvard, Blumenthal was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. During this time, he became editor-in-chief of The Harvard Crimson.
Blumenthal was selected for a Fiske Scholarship, which enabled him to study at the University of Cambridge in England for a year after graduating from Harvard College. After his year in England, he went to Yale Law School, where he served as editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Review. He worked alongside the future Secretary of Labor of the United States, Robert Reich, who was one of his co-editors.
Wife
Blumenthal’s wife, Cynthia Malkin, is the daughter of a wealthy real estate investor, Peter Malkin. He is Chairman Emeritus of the Empire State Realty Trust, which owns a large number of buildings throughout New York City, including the Empire State Building. Anthony Malkin (Cynthia’s brother) was appointed President and CEO of Empire State Realty Trust in 2013.
He met his wife at age 31 and she was only 16 when he was at a party in Greenwich. They met again years later at the wedding of Cynthia’s cousin when she had just started attending Harvard University. They became engaged in their final year of study and married in 1982, a year later, after she graduated. She was 21 and 36 years old.
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Family
Richard Blumenthal has been married to Cynthia Blumenthal (née Malkin) for over 30 years. They have four children: Claire, Matthew, David, and Michael Blumenthal. His parents were Martin Blumenthal and Jane Blumenthal (née Rosenstock) and his brother David Blumenthal; the President of the Commonwealth Fund.
Matthew Blumenthal, Richard’s eldest son, is running for state commissioner for the 147th District of Connecticut. Matthew Blumenthal is a graduate of Harvard University and Yale Law School and, like his father, joined the Marine Corps Reserve. He led a rifle platoon in Afghanistan in 2011. David Blumenthal, Richard’s second son, is studying law in Georgetown.
Richard’s brother, David Blumenthal, is an academic doctor and expert in health policy. He served on the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Human Resources, Health, and Scientific Research as a professional staff member in the late 1970s. In 1991, he became head of the Department of Health Policy Research and Development at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Vietnam War
During the Vietnam War, Blumenthal received five conscription deferrals. The first was an education deferral and the others were based on his occupation. In April 1970, Blumenthal enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Reserve, which is generally considered an alternative for those who want to avoid service in Vietnam.