CARTHAGE, Tenn. — Vice President Al Gore’s father, Albert Gore Sr., who served in Congress for three decades and was a leading opponent of the Vietnam War and a key force behind the interstate highway system, died Saturday. He was 90.
Gore died of natural causes at his home, a statement from the vice president’s office said. The vice president and his wife, Tipper, were at his bedside.
A leader among Democrats, Gore served in the Senate from 1953 to 1970. Gore was a key opponent of the Vietnam War as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. His son, however, enlisted in the Army after his graduation from Harvard and spent two years in Vietnam as an Army journalist.
An unabashed liberal who made few concessions to the will of Tennessee voters, Gore voted against two of President Nixon’s Southern Supreme Court nominees: Clement F. Haynsworth Jr. and G. Harrold Carswell. His votes earned him then-Vice President Spiro T. Agnew’s famous epithet, “Southern regional chairman of the Eastern Liberal Establishment.”
His opposition to the war and his liberal positions were blamed for his defeat in 1970 by Republican Bill Brock, scion of a wealthy candy-making family. Gore retired from public life after his defeat.
Six years later, his son was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, then to the Senate in 1984. After a failed presidential try in 1988, the younger Gore was elected vice president as Bill Clinton’s running mate in 1992.
President Clinton paid tribute Saturday night to the senior Gore, calling him a valuable public servant “who helped connect the South with the rest of America.”
Gore himself had briefly been a vice presidential candidate to Adlai E. Stevenson III during the 1956 Democratic national convention. He withdrew in favor of fellow Tennessee Sen. Estes Kefauver, who won the nomination. The Democratic ticket lost to the Republican incumbent Dwight D. Eisenhower.
When Gore was first elected to the Senate, in 1952, he had already served 14 years in the U.S. House, taking time out for Army service during World War II.
In the 1950s, the elder Gore introduced legislation to create the interstate highway system, promoting it as a national defense network modeled on the German autobahn that he had seen during World War II service. The bill was passed in 1956.
“The multiplication of automobiles and trucks made our narrow, free-access highways completely out of date,” Gore said. The interstate system now totals 44,000 miles.
After his defeat in the Senate, the onetime schoolteacher-farmer was named to the board of Island Creek Coal Co., a subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum Corp., by Armand Hammer. Gore’s farm at Carthage also contains extensive copper, zinc and germanium ore.
The former senator’s life was not always comfortable. Born Dec. 26, 1907, in the mountain community of Granville, Gore moved with his family to the Carthage area when he was 2.
He received his early education in the one-room Possum Hollow school and later became a teacher in one-room schools himself. That gave him the money to put himself through Middle Tennessee State College, from where he graduated in 1932.
His first elective office was Smith County school superintendent. While serving in that job, he studied law at Nashville’s YMCA Law School and operated a tobacco-grading barn.
Gore and his wife, Pauline LaFon Gore, were married in 1937. Besides their son, the vice president, they also had a daughter, Nancy, who died of lung cancer at age 45 in 1984.
Postcolonial scholar Mahmood Mamdani says Palestinian rights helped motivate his son Zohran’s run for New York City mayor. He says Zohran didn’t expect to win, but entered the race “to make a point” and trounced his rivals because he refused to compromise on causes “near and dear” to him.
Mahmood Mamdani on his son’s innovative and uncompromising drive to become NYC mayor – and his awareness of the enormity of the job ahead.
Mahmood Mamdani, father of New York City’s Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, says his son’s drive is both innovative and uncompromising – and he is fully aware of the enormity of the job ahead.
It’s more than two hours before Sherman Oaks Notre Dame’s football team plays in a Southern Section playoff game, and there’s one big teenager lying on his back at the 50-yard line with headphones on. Samson Fatu, 6 feet 5 and 305 pounds, is using the all-weather turf as his “Sleep Number bed.”
“Here I Am,” a song by J Boog, is playing on his headphones. This is the way Fatu focuses before a game.
He’s a starting offensive tackle for Notre Dame, which hosts Chino Hills in a Division 3 playoff game on Friday. His father, Rikishi, is in the WWE Hall of Fame. Three brothers are pro wrestlers and don’t be surprised if Samson one day becomes the latest Samoan family member to start throwing people down. He’s that big and strong and anyone named Samson has star power.
He’s finally healthy after getting injured last season. Get your photos of the big kid with lots of hair. One day you might be watching him on TV in football or wrestling.
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].
Cleto Escobedo III, the bandleader of Cleto and the Cletones, the house band for “Jimmy Kimmel Live!,” has died. The musician and lifelong friend of Kimmel was 59.
Kimmel confirmed Escobedo’s death early Tuesday morning in an Instagram post later that day, writing that “we lost a great friend, father, son, musician and man.”
“To say that we are heartbroken is an understatement,” Kimmel continued. “Cleto and I have been inseparable since I was nine years old. The fact that we got to work together every day is a dream neither of us could ever have imagined would come true. Cherish your friends and please keep Cleto’s wife, children and parents in your prayers.”
The news of Escobedo’s death comes after “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” was abruptly canceled Thursday , reportedly due to a “personal matter.” The cause of Escobedo’s death was not immediately released.
Escobedo had led the band through the late-night show since its premiere in 2003, playing alongside a group of musicians that included his father, Cleto Escobedo Jr.
Escobedo was an accomplished professional musician, having toured with Earth, Wind and Fire’s Philip Bailey and Paula Abdul and recorded with Marc Anthony, Tom Scott and Take Six. When Kimmel got his own ABC late-night talk show in 2003, he pushed for Escobedo to lead the house band, he told WABC in 2015.
“Of course I wanted great musicians, but I wanted somebody I had chemistry with,” Kimmel told the outlet. “And there’s nobody in my life I have better chemistry with than him.”
In an August 2016 episode, Kimmel wished Escobedo a happy 50th birthday and highlighted his long-standing relationship with the musician. They met in 1977 when Kimmel’s family moved in across the street from the Escobedos in Las Vegas. “We began a lifetime of friendship that was highlighted by the kind of torture that only an older brother can inflict on you without being arrested,” Kimmel said before sharing a series of stories about their sibling-like bond and Escobedo’s antics.
“I can’t wait till your kids turn 12 and see this, and find out their father is a secret maniac,” Kimmel said. The host also shared photos of them as children, including one of Escobedo playing the saxophone and Kimmel playing the clarinet.
In addition to his father and other family members, Escobedo is survived by his wife, Lori, and their two children.
As Los Angeles city officials worked on an agreement to modernize the Convention Center, more than one member of the McOsker family was playing a key role.
City Councilmember Tim McOsker supported the $2.6-billion expansion, which could bring more tourism but threatens to further exacerbate Los Angeles’ dire fiscal situation.
Nella McOsker, his daughter, runs the Central City Assn., an influential downtown Los Angeles business group, which advocated strenuously for the project.
And his nephew, Emmett McOsker, who was an aide to former Mayor Eric Garcetti, works for the Tourism Department — handling the Convention Center.
Central City Assn. President and Chief Executive Nella McOsker.
(Juliana Yamada/Los Angeles Times)
Nella McOsker often argued for the project as her father listened with his council colleagues. In September, he cast a “yes” vote.
“It’s just a family tradition of public service,” said Doane Liu, executive director of the Tourism Department, who is a longtime friend and former colleague of Tim McOsker — and Emmett McOsker’s boss. “I wish there were more McOskers working at City Hall.”
And there are. Flying a little beneath the radar, due to her last name, is a fourth family member, Anissa Raja — the councilmember’s niece (cousin to Emmett and Nella), who is also his legislative director and president of the Los Angeles County Young Democrats.
Raja does not lead with the fact that she is the councilmember’s relative.
“I don’t mention it because I’m a staffer. I keep it professional at work,” she said.
While the interplay between McOskers can create potential conflicts of interest, Nella says she logs every lobbying conversation she has with Tim’s office to the city’s Ethics Commission, just like she does with other councilmembers.
Plus, she and her dad often disagree. And in L.A. city government, lobbying a close family member is perfectly legal, as long as neither party has a financial stake.
“As a city, we made a policy decision that it shouldn’t be just because you’re related to someone that you can’t try to exert influence over them if they’re in an elected position,” said Jessica Levinson, a professor of law at Loyola Marymount University and former head of the city’s Ethics Commission.
Councilmember Tim McOsker speaking during a 2023 meeting at City Hall.
(Jay L. Clendenin/Los Angeles Times)
For decades, the McOskers — a large, tight-knit Irish Catholic family from San Pedro — have wielded power at Los Angeles City Hall. Unlike the Garcettis and the Hahns, the McOskers have not served in citywide or countywide elected office. But their breadth of influence in Los Angeles politics over the last quarter century may be unparalleled.
The McOskers are hardly alone in making city politics the family business.
There’s Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, whose father-in-law Zev Yaroslavsky once held her seat. And Herb Wesson, the former council speaker, whose son was his aide and whose daughter-in-law Alexis Wesson is chief of staff to Councilmember Adrin Nazarian.
Sometimes that leads to family members bumping up against each other in questionable ways.
Eric Garcetti’s father, Gil Garcetti — perhaps best known for being L.A. County district attorney during the O.J. Simpson trial — was president of the Ethics Commission when his son was on the City Council. That led to issues in 2006, when Gil inadvertently contributed to Eric’s reelection campaign, which was not allowed. Or consider Councilmember Curren Price, who has been charged with allegedly voting in favor of development projects his wife’s company was being paid to consult for.
The McOskers’ tradition of city service predates Tim, who worked for City Attorney James Hahn in the 1990s before becoming Hahn’s chief of staff when Hahn was mayor in the early 2000s. Tim’s father, Mac, was a city firefighter, which many in the family cite as the origin of the public service bug.
To this day, the family is as much, or more of, a fire family than a politics family — and some members have combined the two.
Tim’s brother Patrick is a retired LAFD engineer who served as president of United Firefighters of Los Angeles City, the powerful firefighters union. Another brother, Mike, who died in 2019, was vice president of the same union.
Emmett, Patrick’s son, said his father was always his hero and that he wanted to be a firefighter. But when he graduated college in 2011 following the Great Recession, the fire department wasn’t hiring, so he got into politics instead.
Tim, too, aspired to be a firefighter at one point. Two of his children are firefighters, one for LAFD and the other for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, while a cousin works for the county fire department.
In 2003, then-Councilmember Janice Hahn — sister of Mayor James Hahn and daughter of longtime county supervisor Kenneth Hahn — told The Times that Tim and his brothers Patrick, Mike and John (then vice president of the city’s Harbor Area Planning Commission) “are involved in everything.”
Rebecca Liu Morales, a former aide to then-Councilmember Eric Garcetti, was Nella McOsker’s close childhood friend in San Pedro.
“We grew up super familiar with public life and what it looks like. We were dragged to campaign events. We spent Saturdays volunteering,” said Liu Morales, who as Doane Liu’s daughter was also raised in a political family.
Little did Nella McOsker know that decades down the line, she would still be attending her father’s campaign events, helping him get elected to the City Council in 2022.
She worked as his operations director, referring to herself as his “Ego Killer” for always being willing to knock him down a peg. The campaign was filled out by volunteers from the family, from Tim’s wife, Connie, to brother Patrick, who was an avid doorknocker.
One politico who lives in the district noted that two McOskers separately knocked on his door and a third called him as part of a phone banking operation.
After Tim won his council seat, Nella took a job running the Central City Assn. Now, she lobbies councilmembers, including her father’s office.
Councilmember McOsker, along with Councilmember Yaroslavsky, proposed a law in 2023 that would have required lobbyists like Nella who are close relatives of councilmembers or high-level council staffers to disclose the relationship. They would have been prohibited from lobbying on land use development projects in that councilmember’s district. Because Nella works on issues involving downtown, not the San Pedro area, she and Tim would likely not have been affected. The law was never passed.
Rob Quan, who runs a transparency-focused good government advocacy group, said there is no evidence that the McOskers have leveraged their relationships for undue advantage.
Tim said the family rarely talks local politics at dinners and holidays. First off, there are so many of them that the atmosphere can become chaotic.
Last time he hosted Thanksgiving, Tim said about 47 people showed up, and the tables stretched all the way outside onto the back patio. Mostly, they dote on the kids, and cousins reconnect.
“It’s not a lot about politics. It’s a lot about family,” Tim said.
When politics do come up, the McOskers often land on opposite sides.
Tim said he disagreed with his firefighter daughter Miranda and his brother Patrick, who believed LAFD Chief Kristin Crowley should have been reinstated after Mayor Karen Bass ousted her over her handling of the Palisades fire. The two showed up with other firefighters at the council chambers when the council was voting on the issue.
“You can’t have a mayor and a chief of fire … on different pages. It is dangerous,” Tim said.
While Tim and Nella both supported the Convention Center expansion, the two have split on other issues.
“There’s a different intensity I can get to with him [than with other councilmembers],” she said, referring to her conversations with her father about politics.
This summer, Nella McOsker and the Central City Assn. were part of a business coalition that proposed a ballot measure to repeal the city’s gross receipts tax on businesses, which generates about $800 million for the city annually. Her goal was to help struggling businesses by reducing their taxes.
“Terrible idea,” Tim McOsker said.
That was probably the most annoyed “Tim” got with her, Nella said.
She calls him Tim, not Dad — partially out of decorum in a world where she is lobbying him and his colleagues on a regular basis.
It’s also how she and her four younger siblings grew up — they’ve always called their parents Tim and Connie.
Nella’s son Omero is 4. She says he can be whatever he wants when he grows up, but some in the city family already have their eyes on him.
Former USC and NFL linebacker Keith Browner died Tuesday morning in San Leandro, the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office Coroner’s Bureau confirmed Wednesday. He was 63.
Keith Browner Jr. told TMZ that he talked to his father Monday night when the elder Browning was having stomach problems, vomiting and feeling tired. Browner Jr. said his father told him he would go to the hospital the next morning.
Browner was getting ready to go to the hospital Tuesday morning, according to TMZ, “when he curled over the side of a chair and collapsed to the floor next to his girlfriend.” TMZ also reported that “it appears” Browner suffered a heart attack and that his death was “unexpected and sudden.”
Alameda County authorities provided no cause of death Wednesday.
Born in Warren, Ohio, Browner was the fifth of six brothers, all of whom played college football and four of whom went on to play in the NFL. A second-round pick (30th overall) for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 1984, Browner also played for the San Francisco 49ers, Los Angeles Raiders and San Diego Chargers during a five-year NFL career.
Oldest brother Ross Browner spent 10 years in the NFL, playing for the Cincinnati Bengals and Green Bay Packers. Jimmie Browner Jr. played two years with the Bengals. Joey Browner was a six-time Pro Bowl player who spent nine seasons with the Minnesota Vikings and one with the Buccaneers.
Browner Jr. followed in his father’s footsteps as a college and pro football player. A standout defensive end at Dorsey High, Browner Jr. played three seasons at California and one season with the Houston Texans.
A nephew, Ross Browner’s son Max Starks, played nine years for the Pittsburgh Steelers and one for the St. Louis Rams.
Browner — who was 14 when his father, Jimmie, died of cancer at age 49 — said his mother Julia was the driving force behind her sons’ passion for the sport.
“She’s the one who always urged us to play,” he told the Dayton Daily News in 2023, “and sometimes she’d be right out there with us in the yard when we were having pick-up games.”
A three-sport standout at Warren Harding High, Browner spent four seasons at USC (1980-83), overlapping with brother Joey for the first three. He was named a captain for his final season and finished his college career with six interceptions in 34 games played.
Browner made the NFL’s all-rookie team in 1984. After three years with the Buccaneers, he split the 1987 season between the 49ers and Raiders before spending his final NFL season with the Chargers.
He finished his NFL career with 10.5 sacks, four interceptions (including one returned 55 yards for the Chargers against the Seattle Seahawks in 1988) and five fumble recoveries, then played two seasons in the Canadian Football League and six in the Arena Football League.
Browner is survived by his son and four daughters.
