1933-2023
Dianne Feinstein News: Trailblazing Senator Dies at Age 90
Dianne Feinstein died on September 28 at age 90. The trailblazing U.S. senator had been the oldest member of Congress and the longest-serving female senator in American history. In recent months, she faced criticism after her declining health and memory problems raised questions about her ability to continue serving. Feinstein, who had announced in February she wouldn’t seek an additional term in Congress, had experienced a case of shingles that led to encephalitis and other major medical complications. Still, she continued serving her native California. President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy ordered flags to be lowered at the White House and the U.S. Capitol in her honor.
Who Was Dianne Feinstein?
Dianne Feinstein was a Democratic politician from California who dedicated her life to public service, first on the local level and later on the national one. Becoming acting mayor of San Francisco when the sitting mayor was shot and killed in 1978, she ran for the job the following year and won, holding the post until 1988. Two years later, she ran for governor of California but lost. In 1992, however, she became the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate from California, a seat she held until her death. Feinstein died on September 28, 2023, at age 90.
Quick Facts
FULL NAME: Dianne Feinstein
BORN: June 22, 1933
DIED: September 28, 2023
BIRTHPLACE: San Francisco, California
SPOUSE: Jack Berman (1956-1959), Bertram Feinstein (1962-1978), and Richard Blum (1980-2022)
CHILD: Katherine
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Cancer
Early Years
Dianne Feinstein was born Dianne Emiel Goldman in San Francisco on June 22, 1933. Born into a Jewish family, she attended a Roman Catholic school and a Jewish temple as a child and began showing an interest in politics around age 16. After graduating from San Francisco’s Convent of the Sacred Heart High School, Dianne attended Stanford University, where she was active in student government. She graduated with her bachelor’s degree in 1955.
The following year, Dianne married Jack Berman, whom she met in the San Francisco district attorney’s office, and later had a daughter named Katherine. In 1959, she and Berman divorced. Three years later, she married neurosurgeon Bertram Feinstein she met at a holiday party.
Entering the Public Sphere
In 1960, California Governor Pat Brown appointed Feinstein to the state’s Women’s Board of Parole, making her the youngest member in the nation. She held the spot until 1966, and two years later, she became a member of the San Francisco Committee on Crime, an appointment that colored the rest of her career. In 1969, Feinstein entered her first political race and was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, eventually becoming the first woman ever to serve as the board’s president, a position she held for two and a half terms. She also ran for mayor twice during this period, losing in both the 1971 and 1975 elections.
The year 1978 was a tragic one for Feinstein. It marked the end of her second marriage, due to her husband’s untimely death, and the end of her tenure as board president, when Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk were both assassinated in November. Feinstein first became acting mayor—San Francisco’s first female mayor—then was elected the following year and remained in the post until 1988.
U.S. Senate Career
After a failed 1990 attempt to win the California governorship, Feinstein regrouped and ran in a special election for a seat in the U.S. Senate two years later. She won and was sworn in a week later on November 10, 1992.
Feinstein was reelected five times, beginning with the 1994 election. In the Senate, the moderate Democrat championed gun control and crime reduction efforts, LGBTQ rights, environmental protections, and consumer protections, among other issues. Feinstein was the first woman member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the first woman to chair the Senate Rules and Administration Committee.
Her first term as California’s first female senator was a busy and productive one, as she co-authored the Gun Free Schools Act and the Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act, both signed into law in 1994. Feinstein also spearheaded legislation banning the manufacture, sale, and possession of military-style assault weapons, which was signed into law on September 13, 1994. Although the final bill was a diluted version of Feinstein’s original legislation, it outlawed weapons like Kalashnikov- and AR-15–style rifles typically used in mass shootings. This legislation became one of Feinstein’s best-known legislative accomplishments. The ban expired in 2004, and efforts by Feinstein and other Democrats to renew it haven’t succeeded.
Feinstein was one of just 14 senators to vote against the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in 1996, which defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman, effectively banning same-sex marriage in the United States. She joined an amicus brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to legalize same-sex marriage, which it ultimately did with the landmark case United States v. Windsor in 2013. Feinstein also introduced the Senate version of the Respect for Marriage Act, which repealed DOMA and required all states and territories to recognize the validity of same-sex marriage. The act was signed into law by President Joe Biden in December 2022.
The protection and preservation of California deserts had been a priority for Feinstein from her first term when she sponsored the Desert Protection Act of 1994, which established Death Valley National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, and the Mojave National Preserve. The law protected more than 7.6 million acres of California desert wilderness. Feinstein pushed for the passage of additional public land bills to update and expand those protections.
With her nose always to the political grindstone, Feinstein authored and saw signed into law the Comprehensive Methamphetamine Control Act of 1996 and introduced the Federal Gang Violence Act, which passed as part of the 1997 Juvenile Justice bill (but was not acted on by the House of Representatives).
An untiring champion of the political left, she was also involved with launching and supporting the Crime Victims’ Bill of Rights, the Small Business Defense Conversion Guarantee Act, the expansion of child abduction alert systems, and legislation to create the Breast Cancer Research Stamp. She also championed several bills protecting consumers, including bans of phthalates in children’s toys, legislation to stop rogue Internet pharmacies, and stronger pathogen standards for poultry products.
Beginning in 2009, Feinstein led the Senate’s six-year review of the CIA’s detention and interrogation program—and particularly its use of torture—following the September 11 attacks. The result was a sweeping indictment of the agency and its treatment of terrorism suspects. The full 6,700-page torture report, which drew upon millions of CIA documents, remains classified, but Feinstein helped push for the public release of a 525-page executive summary, which was issued in 2014 over the objections of the agency and President Barack Obama. Feinstein called this the most important work of her career, as well as the most important oversight activity ever conducted by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
A veteran of Washington’s political battles, Feinstein sought to head off the dangers posed by the looming shutdown of the federal government in January 2018, as the two parties squabbled over a spending bill. “Shutting down the government is a very serious thing,” she said. “People die, accidents happen... There is no specific list you can look at and make a judgment: ‘Well everything is going to be just fine.’ You can’t make that judgment. So, I think it’s a last resort. And I’m really hopeful we don’t get to it.”
The following month, Feinstein faced an internal party battle when California Democrats declined to endorse her Senate reelection campaign at their annual convention. Kevin de León, the liberal leader of the California Senate, earned the majority of votes, though he still fell short of the 60 percent needed to claim the party’s endorsement. Feinstein didn’t seem too concerned about the snub, as she held a massive edge in fundraising and a comfortable lead in polls at the time. She went on to defeat de León in the general election by more than eight percentage points.
In 2015, Feinstein worked with North Carolina Senator Richard Burr to secure passage of the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, the nation’s first major cybersecurity bill. It called for information sharing between private companies and the government and included privacy safeguards and liability protections for citizens. President Obama signed the bill into law.
Together with Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley, Feinstein introduced bipartisan legislation in 2022 to reauthorize and update the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which seeks to prevent human and sex trafficking, provide services to victims, and increase federal coordination for the government’s response to the issue. Feinstein also authored a bill to protect young athletes from sexual abuse. Both bills were passed in the Senate.
Husband and Daughter
Feinstein was married three times, most recently to investment banker Richard Blum. The couple wed in 1980 and remained together until his death from cancer in February 2022.
Previously, Dianne was married to Jack Berman for three years, from 1956 to 1959. Together, they had a daughter named Katherine. A year after that marriage ended in divorce, Dianne wed neurosurgeon Bertram Feinstein, who was originally from Canada and nearly 20 years older. Bertram died from cancer in 1978.
Health Problems and Death
Feinstein, then 89, announced in February 2023 that she wouldn’t seek a seventh term in 2024. A month later, she was hospitalized due to shingles, which led to encephalitis and other major medical complications. Despite a three-month absence from Congress, she refused calls to step down early and ignored criticism of her declining health and memory problems. Upon her return, she was unable to recall details and information while answering questions from reporters. Feinstein also told reporters she hadn’t been away from her office, raising further questions about her mental fitness and intensifying calls for her to resign.
Feinstein died on September 28, 2023, at age 90. A cause of death hasn’t been shared.
In a statement after her death, President Joe Biden called Feinstein a “pioneering American” and a “true trailblazer,” adding: “Dianne made her mark on everything from national security to the environment to protecting civil liberties. She’s made history in so many ways, and our country will benefit from her legacy for generations.” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called her “one of the most amazing people who ever graced the Senate, whoever graced the country,” and said “maybe the trait that stood out most of all was her amazing integrity—her integrity was a diamond.”
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