Career in The Senate
In 1986, Daschle was elected to the Senate in a close victory over incumbent Republican James Abdnor, becoming the nation's 1,776th senator. In his first year, he was appointed to the Finance Committee. In 1994, he was chosen by his colleagues to succeed the retiring Senator George Mitchell as Democratic Minority Leader. In the history of the Senate, only Lyndon B. Johnson had served fewer years before being elected to lead his party. In addition to the Minority Leader's post, Daschle also served as a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry. South Dakotans re-elected Daschle to the Senate by overwhelming margins in 1998. At various points in his career, he served on the Veterans Affairs, Indian Affairs, Finance and Ethics Committees.
When the 107th Congress commenced on January 3, 2001, the Senate was evenly divided—that is, there were 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans. Outgoing Vice President Al Gore acted in his constitutional capacity as ex officio President of the Senate, and used his tie-breaking vote to give the Democrats the majority in that chamber. For the next two weeks, Daschle served as Senate Majority Leader. Then, upon the commencement of the Bush administration on January 20, 2001, Dick Cheney became President of the Senate, thereby returning Democrats to the minority in that body; Daschle reverted to the position of Senate Minority Leader. However, on June 6, 2001, Senator Jim Jeffords of Vermont announced in that he was leaving the Senate Republican caucus to become an independent and to caucus with Democrats; this once again returned control of the body to the Democrats and Daschle again became Majority Leader.
Democratic losses in the November 2002 elections returned the party to the minority in the Senate in January 2003 and Daschle once more reverted to being Minority Leader.
Daschle recounted his Senate experiences from 2001 to 2003 in his first book, Like No Other Time: The 107th Congress and the Two Years That Changed America Forever, published in 2003.
Read more about this topic: Tom Daschle
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