Arlen Specter

Overview

Known for
Acting
Gender
Male
Birthday
Feb 12, 1930 (95 years old)

Arlen Specter

Known For

Biden's Decision
1h 53m
Movie 2024

Biden's Decision

The inside story of Biden’s rise to the presidency, and the personal and political forces that shaped him and led to his dramatic decision to step aside.

JFK: What The Doctors Saw
1h 32m
Movie 2023

JFK: What The Doctors Saw

Unsettling medical details on the JFK assassination are disclosed by seven doctors who were in the ER during a futile effort to save his life in 1963.

JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass
1h 59m
Movie 2021

JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass

Thirty years after the release of his film JFK (1991), filmmaker Oliver Stone reviews recently declassified evidence related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, which took place in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

Anita
1h 16m
Movie 2013

Anita

The story of young, brilliant African-American Anita Hill who accuses the Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas of unwanted sexual advances during explosive Senate Hearings in 1991 and ignites a political firestorm about sexual harassment, race, power and politics that resonates today.

Advise & Dissent
Movie 2012

Advise & Dissent

Behind the lines in the Supreme Court confirmation wars... where justice and politics collide.

14 Women
1h 19m
Movie 2007

14 Women

Documentary that explores the lives of 14 female U.S. senators and the uniquely feminine challenges they face, including the sometimes difficult balance between their roles as public servants and wives and mothers.

Biography

Arlen Specter (February 12, 1930 – October 14, 2012) was an American lawyer, author and politician who served as a United States Senator from Pennsylvania from 1981 to 2011. Specter was a Democrat from 1951 to 1965, then a Republican from 1965 until 2009, when he switched back to the Democratic Party. First elected in 1980, he was the longest-serving senator from Pennsylvania, having represented the state for 30 years. Specter was born in Wichita, Kansas, to immigrant Russian/Ukrainian Jewish parents. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and served with the United States Air Force during the Korean War. Specter later graduated from Yale Law School and opened a law firm with Marvin Katz, who would later become a federal judge. Specter served as assistant counsel for the Warren Commission investigating the assassination of John F. Kennedy and helped formulate the "single-bullet theory". In 1965, Specter was elected District Attorney of Philadelphia, a position that he held until 1973. During his 30-year Senate career, Specter staked out a spot in the political center. He served as Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee from 2005 to 2007. In 2006, Specter was selected by Time as one of America's Ten Best Senators. Specter lost his 2010 re-election bid in the Democratic primary to former U.S. Navy vice admiral Joe Sestak, who then lost to Republican Pat Toomey in the general election. Toomey succeeded Specter on January 3, 2011. In 1993, Specter underwent a surgery to remove a brain tumor. In early 2005 he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, but continued his work in the Senate while undergoing chemotherapy. He died from complications of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma on October 14, 2012.

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