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David Gergen Dies: CNN Political Analyst & Presidential Adviser Was 83

Yahoo

12-07-2025

Politics
Yahoo

David Gergen Dies: CNN Political Analyst & Presidential Adviser Was 83

UPDATED with CNN statement: David Gergen, a political analyst for CNN and frequent political commentator who was an adviser to four U.S. presidents, has died. He was 83. His son, Christopher, told The New York Times that the cause was Lewy body dementia. His daughter, Katherine Gergen Barnett, disclosed in December that he had been diagnosed with the illness. More from Deadline 2025 Deaths Photo Gallery: Hollywood & Media Obituaries Trump Celebrity Supporters: Famous Folks In Favor Of The 47th President White House's "Trump As Superman" Meme Quickly Draws Gavin Newsom's Response: Man Of Steel "Was An Undocumented Immigrant" Gergen was the rare figure who served as an adviser to presidents of different parties, including Republicans Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan and Democrat Bill Clinton — experience that he chronicled in his 2001 book Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership, Nixon to Clinton. The bipartisan experience gave him credibility as a commentator that many others lacked, especially in an era flooded with punditry and where just about anyone could call themselves as a 'political strategist.' His stern-yet-understated tone stood out, particularly as he could provide needed context at breaking news moments. Gergen launched his career in journalism and as a commentator in 1984, appearing on PBS' MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour, where he was teamed up with Mark Shields, and later serving as chief editor of U.S. News & World Report. Gergen served as White House director of speechwriting for Nixon, communications director for Ford and Reagan and counselor to Clinton. His appointment to the White House in 1993, just months into Clinton's term, came as a surprise, given his experience with Republican presidents. But the new administration had been beset with a series of early stumbles. When he took the job, Gergen recalled to PBS' Frontline, 'I told him that he was terribly out of position and that he had lurched to the left when he came in and it sent signals to people like me, who thought he was going to be a centrist Democrat, that he had lost his moorings.' Gergen also was a professor of public service and founding director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. A CNN spokesperson said today: 'David was a beloved member of the CNN family — always happy to share his wisdom and his spotlight with others. A political scholar who served four presidents of both parties, an adoring father and dedicated husband, a senior statesman in every sense of the word, and a tireless educator. But above all else, David was a relentlessly kind and warm person. David brought the same level of excellence and care to his role at CNN that he did to all aspects of his life. Our staff, contributors and audiences are better informed because of his towering influence. We will never forget the lessons in compassion and humility that he taught us.' Her is survived by his wife, Anne; his son and daughter; and five grandchildren. Al Gore wrote, 'Of the countless ways that David Gergen contributed to our great country, what I will remember him for most was his kindness to everyone he worked with, his sound judgment, and his devotion to doing good in the world. His innate interest in helping others was what made him so skillful at bypassing the politics of an issue to focus on what really mattered to the American people. I am grateful for the years I worked with him and for his friendship. He was a great man.' Best of Deadline 'The Buccaneers' Season 2 Release Schedule: When Do New Episodes Come Out? 'The Buccaneers' Season 2 Soundtrack: From Griff To Sabrina Carpenter 2025 TV Series Renewals: Photo Gallery

David Gergen, adviser to Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, dies at 83

The Independent

12-07-2025

Politics
The Independent

David Gergen, adviser to Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, dies at 83

Presidential adviser and political commentator David Gergen has died at the age of 83. Gergen served alongside four presidents: Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton. He then spent some time as a magazine editor before going from political insider to TV commentator. Gergen died at a retirement community in Lexington, Massachusetts, on Thursday from Lewy body dementia, his son Christopher said, according to The New York Times. Gergen wrote speeches, briefed reporters, and created communication strategies. He also helped set the agenda for the four presidents he served, with Clinton being the only Democrat among them. He began his political career in the Nixon White House and served as communications director on two occasions, first to Gerald Ford and then to Ronald Reagan. The adviser was given credit for easing the harsh rightwing rhetoric that Reagan's more hardline staffers wanted to use. Clinton brought him back into the White House after a number of political mistakes had set his administration on the wrong course. He lasted roughly a year in the Clinton administration, where some viewed him as an intruder and in a time when many Republicans saw him as a deserter. Following his departure from government, he was lauded by the presidents he had served, and he remained mostly unmarred by the issues that had befallen them. He told The Washington Post in 1981 that he had been slow to understand Nixon's guilt in the Watergate scandal. 'I was young, and I was too naïve. It hardened me up a lot.' Decades later, in a 2021 column for CNN, he wrote President Donald Trump was 'a bully — mean, nasty and disrespectful of anyone in his way.' Speaking to The Boston Globe in 2020, he said, 'Centrism doesn't mean splitting the difference.' 'It's about seeking solutions, and you bring people along. I'm happily in that role,' he added at the time. A tall man, 6-feet-5, Gergen became popular with many reporters at the White House, leaking information often enough to be dubbed 'the sieve,' The Times noted. But some journalists weren't so charmed. Mike Kelly, who died in 2003 during the Iraq War, was one of them. 'To be Gergenized is to be spun by the velveteen hum of this soothing man's soothing voice into a state of such vertigo that the sense of what is real disappears into a blur,' he wrote in The New York Times Magazine in 1993. Gergen told Kelly that he had often been 'selling for the sake of selling.' Spinning 'had nothing to do with ideas,' said Gergen. 'It had nothing to do with anything that was real,' he added. 'Eventually, it became selling the sizzle without the steak. There was nothing connected to it. It was all cellophane. It was all packaging.' Between his tours in the White House, Gergen dabbled in journalism, becoming the managing editor of Public Opinion magazine in 1978. The magazine was published by the conservative American Enterprise Institute. He also served as the editor and columnist at U.S. News & World Report in the mid-1980s. He frequently appeared on television and taught at Duke University and Harvard's Kennedy School. Born on May 9, 1942 in Durham, North Carolina, his father was the chair of the mathematics department at Duke. Graduating from Yale with a degree in American studies in 1963, Gergen was an intern in the office of North Carolina's Democratic Governor, Terry Sanford, for three summers. After earning a law degree from Harvard, he joined the Navy in 1967, serving as an officer on a ship in Japan. He married a Brit, Anne Wilson, whom he met on a blind date that same year.