James A. Johnson, Democratic Energy Dealer, Dies at 76

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James A. Johnson, Democratic Energy Dealer, Dies at 76

In 1988, James A. Johnson, a Democratic operative, was serving to Senator Lloyd Bentsen, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee, put together for


In 1988, James A. Johnson, a Democratic operative, was serving to Senator Lloyd Bentsen, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee, put together for his debate with Senator Dan Quayle, his Republican opponent. In reviewing the analysis, Mr. Johnson seen that Mr. Quayle incessantly in contrast himself to John F. Kennedy and informed Mr. Bentsen and his group to anticipate him to take action on the debate.

When Mr. Quayle stated onstage that he had as a lot expertise in Congress as Kennedy had when he sought the presidency, Mr. Bentsen pounced. “You’re no Jack Kennedy,” he stated in a devastating riposte that is still one of the vital memorable debate moments in American political historical past.

“Jim Johnson was clearly the rationale the senator was ready for that trade,” Jack Martin, a longtime Bentsen aide who was within the room on the time, stated in an interview.

A pillar of the Washington institution, Mr. Johnson would parlay his in depth political abilities right into a second profession in finance and emerge as a significant energy dealer who concurrently led three distinguished establishments: Fannie Mae, the Kennedy Middle and the Brookings Establishment.

Mr. Johnson died on Sunday at his residence in Washington. He was 76. His son, Alfred, stated the trigger was issues of a neurological illness.

Mr. Johnson was so nicely linked and held so many highly effective posts that Harold M. Ickes, additionally a Democratic operative and President Invoice Clinton’s deputy chief of employees, informed The Washington Put up in 1998 that he was “the chairman of the universe.”

Even Mr. Johnson had a tough time describing what he did for a dwelling. When folks would ask, he stated in a 2016 oral historical past, he would say, “I do some sort of mixture of public coverage, politics, authorities, philanthropy and enterprise.”

At one other juncture, he defined his work this fashion: “I speak.” However by no means out of faculty. In 2004, as he declined to disclose particulars of the vice-presidential search he was main for Senator John Kerry, he informed The New York Instances, “I’d discreetly characterize myself as discreet.”

Nonetheless, he ran among the most influential establishments within the nation’s capital. Essentially the most consequential was Fannie Mae, the mortgage-finance big that he helped construct into one of many dominant monetary establishments on this planet.

As chairman and chief government, he led Fannie Mae to file income; its web earnings greater than tripled to $3.91 billion in 1999, the yr after he retired. Mr. Johnson made an estimated $100 million himself in eight years with the corporate.

He proved an aggressive lobbyist for Fannie Mae — making strategic monetary donations to congressional regulators, hiring former public officers from each events and paying for educational research that blunted criticism of among the firm’s riskier monetary practices. He was lengthy gone earlier than the subprime mortgage disaster hit, however he was faulted for encouraging practices that contributed to the 2008 housing meltdown.

Mr. Johnson was the “nameless architect of the public-private homeownership drive that just about destroyed the economic system in 2008,” Gretchen Morgenson, then a enterprise journalist at The New York Instances, and Joshua Rosner, a monetary analyst, wrote in “Reckless Endangerment” (2011), which explored the origins of the monetary disaster.

“He was particularly adept at manipulating lawmakers, eviscerating regulators and leaving taxpayers with the invoice,” they added.

Within the 2016 oral historical past, Mr. Johnson skirted the controversies of his tenure at Fannie Mae. As a substitute he targeted on the corporate’s objectives of serving to low-income households, immigrants and younger folks receive mortgages and personal their very own properties, which he stated was a part of the American dream.

He additionally shared a bit of recommendation that he had obtained whereas operating Fannie Mae: “By no means say you’re within the secondary mortgage market; say you’re within the American dream enterprise.”

Certainly, all through his profession he supported racial and financial equality, beginning along with his participation within the 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala., whereas he was in school.

Later, when he was chairman of the John F. Kennedy Middle for the Performing Arts, he and his spouse on the time, Maxine Isaacs, created and underwrote the Millennium Stage, which gives free live shows and different performances 365 days a yr, making the elite Kennedy Middle extra accessible.

And as chairman of the Brookings Establishment, a liberal analysis group, he recruited students, writers and thinkers to check demographic developments in city areas and the intersection of race and public coverage. With funding from the Fannie Mae Basis, he began the establishment’s Middle on City and Metropolitan Coverage, now the Metropolitan Coverage Program.

James Arthur Johnson was born on Dec. 24, 1943, in Benson, Minn., a small city alongside the Chippewa River the place his Norwegian grandparents had settled. Inside two blocks, there have been 14 homes crammed along with his aunts, uncles and cousins.

His mom, Adeline (Rasmussen) Johnson, taught Latin and German on the native highschool. His father, Alfred Ingvald Johnson, owned a grocery retailer and was an actual property dealer. A member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Get together, he was elected to the state legislature and have become speaker of the Home within the late 1950s.

Jim attended the College of Minnesota, the place he was elected pupil physique president in his sophomore yr. He graduated in 1966 with a level in political science.

After incomes his grasp’s diploma in public coverage at Princeton in 1968, he signed on with Eugene J. McCarthy’s antiwar presidential marketing campaign. He would go on to work for a number of Democratic presidential hopefuls over the following 4 a long time, together with Edmund Muskie, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Al Gore and Senator Kerry.

None grew to become president, however Mr. Johnson maintained a status as a realistic, shrewd and trusted insider.

When Mr. Mondale was elected vice chairman in 1976, Mr. Johnson grew to become his government assistant.

“He and I each have been from Minnesota,” Mr. Mondale recalled in an interview, “and we spoke the identical language.”

After Mr. Mondale’s time period led to 1981, Mr. Johnson shaped Public Methods, a political consulting agency, with Richard C. Holbrooke, who grew to become a prime diplomat in a number of Democratic administrations.

Mr. Johnson returned to politics to handle Mr. Mondale’s ill-fated marketing campaign for president in 1984. Mr. Mondale stated within the interview that his landslide lack of 49 states to President Ronald Reagan was no reflection on Mr. Johnson. “I wasn’t an excellent candidate,” he stated.

Mr. Johnson and Mr. Holbrooke offered Public Methods in 1985 to Shearson Lehman Brothers, the place they each grew to become managing administrators within the funding banking division. Mr. Johnson left in 1990 to hitch Fannie Mae as vice chairman; he grew to become chairman and chief government in 1991.

He stayed out of presidential politics whereas at Fannie Mae. After leaving, he returned for delicate duties, serving to Democratic candidates with their vice-presidential choice, debate negotiations and transition planning.

He briefly led the vice-presidential choice course of for Senator Barack Obama in 2008, however he stepped down following a Wall Road Journal report that he had obtained preferential mortgage charges from Countrywide Monetary, the mortgage firm on the middle of the subprime lending disaster.

Along with his son, Mr. Johnson is survived by his spouse, Heather Muir Kirby, a managing director at Deutsche Financial institution; a sister, Marilyn LaMourea; and a grandson. His marriages to Katherine Marshall and Ms. Isaacs led to divorce.

After leaving Fannie Mae, Mr. Johnson joined the boards of a number of corporations, together with Goldman Sachs and Goal. Since 2011, he had been chairman of the advisory council of the Stanford Middle on Longevity, which seeks to implement technological advances to assist older folks dwell wholesome and rewarding lives.



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