Barney Frank – Biography
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The first American congressman to voluntarily come out as gay was Barney Frank. His contributions to the American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act of 2008 are also well known.
Barney Frank- Birth, Age, Ethnicity, Siblings, Education
In Bayonne, New Jersey, on March 31, 1940, Barney Frank was conceived. The Massachusetts Democrat was elected to Congress in 1980, and in 1987 he came out as gay. Frank spent a lot of time working on the 2008-passed American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act. In July 2012, he tied the knot with Jim Ready, his longtime partner.
Barney Frank, a Democratic congressman from Massachusetts, is regarded as one of the most prominent gay politicians in the country. Born Barnett Frank and raised in Bayonne, New Jersey by Elsie and Samuel Frank. Because he refused to testify against his brother, who was involved in a kickback scam, his father, who managed a truck stop in Jersey City, was sentenced to a year in prison.
Despite the occurrence, according to a January 2009 piece in The New Yorker, Frank’s parents instilled in him and his three brothers “a trust in the potential of the government to do good.”
In addition to teaching undergraduate courses while pursuing his doctorate in philosophy in government, Frank graduated from Harvard College in 1962. After that, he worked for Massachusetts Congressman Michael Harrington and later became chief assistant to Boston Mayor Kevin. While attending Harvard Law School in 1972, Frank served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives for eight years. He passed the Massachusetts bar exam in 1979.
Frank taught part-time at his alma college and several other universities, including Boston University, while he served in state government. He also wrote political and public affairs pieces.
Frank made the decision to run for higher office in the late 1970s, and in 1980 he ran for and won the U.S. House of Representatives 4th Congressional District seat, which he continued to hold on to through all subsequent elections. In November 2011, he said that he will not run for office again the following year.
Before he entered the race for Congress, Frank told friends he was gay, but he kept his sexual orientation a secret from the general public until May 30, 1987. Frank, the first congressman to ever come out, stated that one of his motivations for doing so was to avoid becoming like Republican Connecticut congressman Stewart McKinney, who is a closeted bisexual.
Media rumors about McKinney’s sexual orientation started to circulate after his death on May 7, 1987. Frank told the Washington Post, “I don’t want that to happen to me. The former Republican Maryland congressman Bob Bauman’s removal from office following an arrest for soliciting an adolescent male prostitute, according to Edge Boston magazine, served as another impetus for Frank’s admission.
Barney Frank- Relationship, Married Life
In an April 2012 interview with New York Magazine, Frank stated that he wanted to be married while still working because he believed his coworkers needed to engage with a married homosexual man. Additionally, he explained to the reporter his reasoning for leaving Congress at the end of his term.
Frank remarked, “I’ve been doing this since October 1967, and I’ve seen too many folks stay here longer than they ought to.” “I don’t have as much energy as I once did. I’m worn out, and irritable, and I no longer enjoy it. And I detest the media’s pessimism. I believe that the media has become so pessimistic and cynical that it is useless.”
“Smahtguy: The Life and Times of Barney Frank,” a graphic novel based on Barney’s life, was published in 2022 by author and illustrator Eric Omer.
Barney Frank- Professional Career
On May 18, 2019, American actor Miles Teller smiles for the camera during a photocall for the movie “Too Old To Die, Young – North of Hollywood, West of Hell” at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival in Cannes, southern France.
WASHINGTON, DC – MARCH 02: On March 2, 2011, in Washington, DC, ranking member U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) interrogates U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke during his testimony at a hearing of the House Financial Services Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill on receiving “the Monetary Policy Report to the Congress required under the Humphrey-Hawkins Act.”
On October 2, 2010, in New York City, actor Ben Whishaw attended the premiere of “The Tempest” as part of the 48th New York Film Festival. (Image courtesy of Getty Images/Astrid Stawiarz) Local captioning Whishaw, Ben
Frank gained notoriety throughout his 32-year tenure in the U.S. Congress for his work on mortgage foreclosure bailout concerns and engagement in the House Financial Services Committee.
The Washington Post published a story examining Frank’s impact on the 2007 housing crisis not long after he announced his impending resignation from Congress. The article’s conclusion was as follows: “Barney Frank didn’t trigger the housing crisis.”
Fannie Mae actively resisted attempts to regulate its operations and tax its earnings by the federal government. Frank, who received $42,350 in campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac between 1989 and 2008, was one of the senators it “extravagantly favored” with one of its strategies. However, Frank also attempted in 2005 to co-sponsor a bipartisan House bill to establish an independent regulator for businesses; unfortunately, it was defeated in the Senate.
Frank backed the adoption of the American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act after the subprime mortgage crisis, which aimed to shield homeowners from foreclosure. The 2008 law is now seen as one of Frank’s most significant and challenging concerns.
When Frank was 72 years old and Jim Ready was 42 years old when they got married, it was 25 years after he came out to the country. In a ceremony performed by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, Frank and Ready exchanged vows at the Boston Marriott Newton in Boston on the evening of Saturday, July 7, 2012. Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi and other prominent politicians attended the ceremony, but media representatives were not allowed.
Frank “made another determined first step… [and will] spend the rest of his tenure in office as the nation’s first congressman in a same-sex marriage,” according to The Washington Post, by exchanging vows in Massachusetts six months before the conclusion of his congressional career.
