Bill Richardson’s dual U.S.-Mexican heritage
and his ability to interact in Washington’s policy
circles facilitated his success as a policy aide and
as a Member of the U.S. House. During his 14 years in
Congress, Richardson responded to constituent requests,
burnished his foreign policy credentials, and raised the
stature of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. He also
crafted a unique role as a diplomatic troubleshooter for the
William J. (Bill) Clinton administration. Of the power that
comes with public service, Richardson wrote, “Politics in a
democracy is a competition over ideas, and it is inevitable
there will be winners and losers. Any freely elected
politician who says he doesn’t crave power to get the laws
and programs he thinks best for his city, state, or nation
is either dissembling or belongs in a different business.”1
The son of William Blaine Richardson, Jr., and Maria
Louisa Lopez-Collada, William Blaine Richardson III was
born in Pasadena, California, on November 15, 1947.
As a manager for the National City Bank of New York (a
predecessor to Citibank), Richardson’s father worked in
a number of foreign countries before settling in Mexico
City, where he met his future wife Maria, who was a
secretary at the bank. Richardson recalled his father “was
proud of his American son, and my mother was very
proud of her Mexican son. Their pride was passed down
to me, and I grew up honoring both the United States and
Mexico and the language and culture of each country.”
Richardson and his sister, Vesta, were raised in a bilingual
household; his father spoke to the children in English,
and his mother addressed them in Spanish.2 Richardson
attended school in Mexico City for seven years and then
boarded at a private school in Concord, Massachusetts.
He subsequently attended his father’s alma mater, Tufts
University, in Medford, Massachusetts. Majoring in
political science and French, Richardson became active in politics when he ran for the presidency of his fraternity
and won. Richardson recalled that experience as “my first
taste of politics.… I liked all the organizing … and I found
that I was good at it. I started to appreciate that there was
power that came with the office.”3 After receiving his B.A.
in 1970, Richardson applied to the Fletcher School of
Law and Diplomacy in Bedford, Massachusetts, where he
participated in student government. He graduated with an
M.A. in international affairs in 1971 and married his high
school and college sweetheart, Barbara Flavin, in 1972.
The Richardsons have no children.4
After college, Richardson moved to Washington,
D.C., where he worked as a staff member for
Representative F. Bradford Morse of Massachusetts,
a moderate Republican, from 1971 to 1973. In 1974
Richardson left to work as a congressional relations aide
for the State Department. “Human-rights issues at the
State Department,” he recalled, “were what made me
a Democrat.”5 In 1976 Richardson returned to Capitol
Hill to work as a staffer for the Senate Committee on
Foreign Relations until 1978.6
Eight years of working as a staffer convinced
Richardson that aides could affect the way legislation
was implemented, but he decided that type of influence
“was no substitute for the power to do good things for
people that comes with elected office.” Richardson’s
itinerant early life had prevented him from building
an electoral base from which to launch a political career.
After speaking with the staff of Senator Joseph Montoya,
Richardson decided to move to New Mexico to “work
hard in Democratic politics, make a contribution, and
eventually run for office.… I told one and all that my
ambition was to run for the United States Congress.”7
Richardson introduced himself to the New Mexico
political establishment and immersed himself in state politics for two years. While establishing his political
bona fides, Richardson opened a consulting firm, taught
politics and government in Santa Fe, and prepared himself
to run against six-term incumbent Manuel Luján, Jr., in
New Mexico’s First Congressional District.8 A mixture of
liberal and conservative areas encompassing Albuquerque
and Santa Fe—two of the state’s largest cities—the district
spanned the northeastern and north-central portions of
New Mexico.9
Richardson announced his candidacy in September
1979 and promised to bring industry and jobs to northern
New Mexico using public and private resources.10 He
believed casting Lujan as a puppet of the energy industry—“an almost invisible presence in Washington” who “voted
against the interests of his district”—would give him a
decent chance of winning. Compensating for limited
financial support from Democratic political organizers,
and minimal name recognition, Richardson financed his
campaign using donations from organized labor PACs and
a $100,000 inheritance.11 House Speaker Thomas P. (Tip) O’Neill of Massachusetts and prominent officials from
the James Earl (Jimmy) Carter administration eventually
backed him. “I was campaigning twelve or fourteen hours
a day, seven days a week, and Lujan was doing nothing,”
Richardson recalled. Richardson lagged in the polls one
week before the election but managed to gain ground. Luján
clung to his seat, with 51 percent of the vote to Richardson’s
49 percent.12 Although the Democratic National Campaign
Committee offered to pay for a recount, Richardson
declined. “I was ecstatic,” he said. “I had prepared myself to
lose: All I wanted was to lose respectably so that my political
prospects were not foreclosed.” 13
In 1982, Richardson ran in the newly created Third
District, which covered much of northwestern New
Mexico and included the major cities of Farmington
and Santa Fe. Its majority-Hispanic population had sent
many nuevomexicano Delegates, Representatives, and
Senators to Washington. The district contained numerous
American Indian reservations along the Rio Grande and its
tributaries, a surplus of natural resources such as oil, gas,
and coal, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory, a top-tier
research lab and the birthplace of the atomic bomb.
It also drew upon a mixture of political ideologies, with
conservative San Juan County and Farmington offset by
liberal voters in the state capital of Santa Fe.14 Richardson
described the district as “tailor-made for a Democrat
and a Hispanic.” He filed early to run for the seat, but
met resistance from long-standing political bosses who
encouraged their acolytes to run for the seat. The result
was a fight for the June 1982 Democratic primary between
Richardson, lieutenant governor Roberto Mondragon,
district judge George Perez, and future Congressman and
Senator Tom Udall.15
Behind in the early polls, Richardson reached beyond
his nuevomexicano base by appealing to conservative Anglo
Democrats in the district’s larger cities and to Navajo
voters who had backed his 1980 run.16 Richardson recalled
a frenetic primary finish: “We logged hundreds of miles
of travel around the new Third, shoring up the Hispanic
base, reinforcing my interest in Anglo voters, telling the
Navajos that I meant it when I said I’d work their interests
in Washington.” Richardson won by a decisive plurality of
36 percent, ahead of Mondragon (30 percent), Perez (19
percent), and Udall (13.5 percent).17
Richardson’s opponent in the general election was
Republican Marjorie Bell Chambers, a two-time member
of the Los Alamos county council, a former president
of Colorado College, and a nationally recognized expert
on civil rights and education issues. Both candidates
promised to bring industry and economic opportunities
to the district, pressing the state for tax incentives and the
federal government for job training and environmental
protection. Richardson criticized the Ronald W. Reagan
administration’s economic policies and garnered
endorsements from Speaker O’Neill and Senator Edward
(Ted) Kennedy of Massachusetts.18 Chambers, a lifelong
New Mexican, brought up Richardson’s recent move to the
state and compared him to a “Ping-Pong ball, first coming
up on one side of an issue and then popping up on the
other side.” Richardson recalled, Chambers “came at me
from the start with an odd and out-of-character bias: Let’s
send this guy back to Mexico.”19 Richardson canvassed the district—in which Democrats outnumbered Republicans
nearly three to one—and won 64 percent of the vote on
Election Day. In his victory speech, Richardson said he
would begin working “tomorrow morning.… I promised
to be a fighter, so I’ve got my work cut out for me,” he
added. In each of his six subsequent re-election campaigns,
Richardson earned at least 60 percent of the vote.20
Richardson embraced a straightforward approach
to his congressional career: “Err on the side of trying to
do too much rather than the side of doing too little.”
Upon entering Congress, Richardson won seats on the
Energy and Commerce and Veterans’ Affairs Committees,
but he quickly grew frustrated with the Veterans’ Affairs
assignment. He moved to the House Committee on the
Interior (later Natural Resources), whose jurisdiction
included Indian affairs, natural resources, and public
lands. Between the Energy and Commerce and Interior
Committees, Richardson could oversee some of New
Mexico’s most important interests. Richardson also served
on the Education and Labor Committee and on two
select committees, and he was the first Hispanic-American
Member to serve on the Permanent Select Committee
on Intelligence. He served as chairman of the Interior
Committee’s Subcommittee on Native American Affairs
in the 103rd Congress (1993–1995).21
According to a popular political study, Richardson
maintained a liberal voting record, with few exceptions.
He tended to vote pro-business, especially on issues that
affected his oil and gas constituencies in New Mexico. He
also advocated for pro-business enterprise zones, especially
between the United States and Latin American countries.22
Between his duties in Washington and his constituent
casework, Richardson maintained a punishing schedule.
“During my fourteen years in Congress,” Richardson
recalled, “I averaged at least a couple of weekends a month
in my home district.” Consistent with his reputation, he
described his approach as “moving a thousand miles an
hour, hustling on all my committees and working my
staff to death.”23
Early in his congressional career, Richardson scored
a victory for his American Indian constituents with the passage of two bills that entrusted a portion of federal lands
to the Pueblos.24 As chairman of the Subcommittee on
Native American Affairs, Richardson proposed a number
of bills involving health, education, and employment
initiatives that became law. Richardson also shepherded to
passage H.R. 4487, a bill that amended the Public Health
Service Act by extending the National Health Service
Corps and providing grants to states that supported rural
health offices.25
Richardson took seriously his role as a Representative
of Hispanic descent. He recalled that he “was not interested
in becoming a professional Hispanic, but my heritage
was central to my identity, and I was proud of it.” Early
in his first term, Richardson was elected chairman of the
Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC). Later, he learned
that Edward Roybal of California and Robert Garcia of
New York, both previous chairs of the caucus, “settled
on me as chairman, despite my rookie status, to avoid a
divisive fight” for the seat. Richardson used his platform
as chairman to feature legislation that affected Hispanic
Americans and U.S. relations with Latin America. He
also enhanced the CHC’s influence and effectiveness
by providing it with more public exposure.26
Richardson’s strong interest in foreign affairs was
manifest in his efforts to promote democratization and
business interactions with Latin America in the 1980s.
Richardson called for the United States to engage Latin
American nations by providing economic aid and actively
encouraging political democratization.27 He noted that
“military dictatorships were being cast aside … one-party
rule was getting competition at last … and new
leaders were committed to free elections that were
emerging everywhere.” Richardson viewed these changes
as “developments to be encouraged by the United States,
which wasn’t always subtle or skillful in its application of
carrots and sticks.” Taking to the House Floor, Richardson
criticized parts of the Reagan administration’s approach,
especially as it related to El Salvador and Nicaragua.28
However, Richardson openly criticized Nicaraguan
President Daniel Ortega, the leader of the communist
Sandinista Party, both in the press and to Ortega’s face. Ortega “promised land reform and an inclusive
government,” Richardson recalled. “Instead, he ruled as
head of a junta that consolidated power and ran roughshod
over all opposition.” When a congressional delegation
led by the CHC visited Nicaragua in December 1984,
Richardson and Ortega “had a verbal fight: He defended
his policies and I attacked his deteriorating record on
human rights.”29 Richardson’s position on supporting the
Nicaraguan Contras changed over time. When he entered
Congress, Richardson opposed the Reagan administration’s
efforts to undermine the Sandinista government by
providing military support for the anti-communist Contras.
But in his second term, Richardson criticized the Sandinista
regime’s human rights abuses. He eventually supported
sending the Contras humanitarian aid with stipulations that
the resources could not be used to buy weapons.30
Richardson served as a chief deputy whip for the
House Democrats and an unofficial diplomatic envoy. As
chief deputy whip in the 103rd Congress (1991–1993),
Richardson helped maintain party discipline and count
and round up votes to promote the agenda of House
leadership. Two issues—the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) and the passage of the president’s
first budget plan—dominated that Congress, as President
Clinton began his first term on an active note.31
Richardson described his role as an envoy as a “fact-finding
member of the (House) Intelligence Committee or a
requested negotiator or an unofficial representative
of the Clinton administration. Sometimes I was all three.”
Increasingly, the President asked him to serve abroad, and
Richardson dubbed himself the “informal undersecretary
for thugs” since he worked in countries with repressive
regimes, such as Burma, Haiti, Iraq, Cuba, and North
Korea.32
Richardson was a strong supporter of NAFTA and had
long advocated enterprise free trade zones and emphasized
improving business relations between the United States
and Mexico. With the economic liberalization of
Mexico in the late 1980s, President Carlos Salinas de
Gortari advocated for negotiating a free trade agreement
with the United States to maintain Mexico’s economic growth. In September 1990, President George H. W.
Bush agreed to support the measure and fast-tracked
the legislation per congressional approval in 1991.33 In a
public letter, Richardson advised the Bush administration
to “develop a long-term strategy for free trade throughout
the hemisphere.”34 Although this initiative began in the
Bush administration, President Clinton also supported
the bill’s passage. “If we nix this NAFTA, there will
be little or no hope of renegotiating another deal later
next year or … in our lifetime,” Richardson warned his
colleagues.35 Richardson was one of the chief deputy whips
who rounded up votes for the bill to implement NAFTA
(H.R. 3450). The “complex politics of NAFTA were best
demonstrated by Clinton’s owing his House victory more
to Republicans than to his own party,” Congressional
Quarterly noted. Although Majority Leader Richard Gephardt of Missouri and Majority Whip David Bonior
of Michigan opposed NAFTA, Richardson and other
pro-NAFTA Democrats garnered Democratic support to
ensure the bill’s passage.36
In late 1992, Richardson had sought the nomination
for Secretary of the Interior in the incoming Clinton
administration, but he was passed over in favor of
former Arizona governor Bruce Babbitt.37 In 1997
President Clinton nominated Richardson to serve as the
United States Ambassador to the United Nations. After
a successful confirmation hearing in the U.S. Senate,
Richardson resigned from the House on February 13,
1997.38 In June 1998, President Clinton nominated
Richardson to serve as Secretary of Energy. Confirmed in
August 1998, Richardson served in that capacity for the
remainder of President Clinton’s second term.39 Richardson
later worked in the private sector while preparing for a
gubernatorial run in New Mexico. Elected governor in
2002, he served for two terms (2003–2011).40 In 2007
Richardson announced his candidacy for the Democratic
nomination for U.S. President in the 2008 election, but
he dropped out of the race in January 2008.41 Richardson
currently serves as chairman of Global Political Strategies,
an international business consulting firm.42
View Record in the Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress
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