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NEW YORK (AP) — Former New York US Rep. Charles Lengel, a candid, gravel-voiced Harlem Democrat who spent nearly 50 years on Capitol Hill and was a founding member of Congress’ Black Caucus, passed away Monday at the age of 94.
His family confirmed his death in a statement provided by New York City College spokesman Michelle Stent. He died in a New York hospital, Stent said.
The Korean War veteran began his Congressional career in 1970 when he defeated legendary harem politician Adam Clayton Powell. Over the next 40 years, he became the legend himself. This is a founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus, dean of the New York Congressional Delegation, and in 2007 he was the first African-American to chair the Strong Methods and Means Committee.
He resigned from that committee within the Ethics Cloud, and in 2010 the House denounced him. However, he continued to serve in Congress until 2017, when he decided not to seek reelection.
Lingel was one of four gangsters. African-American politicians who used great power in New York City and state politics, and David Dinkins, New York City’s first black mayor. Percy Sutton was the president of Manhattan Autonomous Borough. Basil Patterson, vice mayor and New York Secretary.
Few people could forget about the lingerie after hearing him speak. His distinctive gravel-tuned voice and his struggling sense of humor were a memorable mix.
That voice was one of the most liberals in the House and the loudest against the Iraq War, and he branded the “death tax” to the poor and minorities. In 2004 he tried to end the war by offering a bill to resume military service drafts. The Republican called his bluff and brought the bill to the vote, and even Wrangel voted against it.
A year later, the battle for the war became fiercely personal with then President Dick Cheney.
Langel said that Cheney, who has a history of heart trouble, might be too sick to do his job.
“I want to believe he’s not just a mean guy, but a sick person,” Wrangel said. After some of such verbal jabs, Cheney said that Wrangel “lost it.”
The charismatic Harlem lawmaker rarely retreated from the battle after first entering the house in 1971 as a kind of dragon slayer.
Rangel became the leader of the House’s leading tax writing committee, which covers programs including Social Security and Medicare, after the midterm elections in 2006, when Democrats ended Republican control for 12 years. However, in 2010, the House Ethics Committee held a hearing on 13 counts of financial and financing misconduct over issues surrounding financial disclosure and the use of congressional resources.
He was convicted of 11 ethics violations. The House discovered that he had failed to pay taxes to his vacation home, filed a misleading financial disclosure form, and improperly sought a donation from the company to the University Center before the committee.
The House followed the recommendation of the Ethics Committee that he would be condemned. This is the most serious punishment that is close to expulsion.
Rangel took care of his constituents and sponsored the Empowerment Zone, which has tax credits for businesses moving towards economically depressed areas and low-income housing developers.
“I’ve always been committed to fighting for the little guy,” Wrangel said in 2012 when he announced he was running for reelection.
During the Korean War, he had earned a purple heart and a bronze star. He always said he even measured days of troubled around ethics scandals in the 1950 era when other soldiers were injured because they didn’t make it.
It became the title of his autobiography: “And I haven’t had a bad day since.”
A dropout from high school, he went to college on the GI bill and earned degrees from New York University and St. John’s Law School.
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