"New York Senator" Al D'Amato Hand Signed 8X10 Color Photo

Description

Up for auction "New York Senator" Al D'Amato Hand Signed 8X10 Color Photo.
ES-1105B
Alfonse Marcello D'Amato
(born August 1, 1937) is an American lawyer and former
New York
politician
. A
Republican
, he served as
United States Senator
from New York from 1981 to 1999. He subsequently founded a lobbying firm, Park Strategies.
As of 2019, D'Amato is the last Republican to represent New York in the U.S. Senate. D'Amato, of
Italian
ancestry, was born in
Brooklyn
and raised on
Long Island
, in the small village of
Island Park
. He is the son of Antoinette (Ciofarri) and Armand D'Amato, an insurance broker. He is a graduate of
Chaminade High School
,
Syracuse University
, and
Syracuse University College of Law
. At Syracuse University, he was a brother at
Alpha Chi Rho
fraternity. D'Amato and second wife Katuria have one son, Alfonso Marcello D'Amato, born in 2008, and a daughter, Luciana Cioffari D'Amato, born in 2009. D'Amato has four adult children from his first marriage. Katuria D'Amato filed for divorce on 3 October 2017.
Alfonse began his career in politics in Island Park. He was involved heavily in the Unity Party of Island Park, the local political party that ran village elections in the small Village of Island Park. He was then appointed the village attorney. After taking the values taught him in Island Park he then went on to the
Nassau County
Republican Party, and he held the appointive position of Public Administrator of Nassau County, where he was responsible for managing the assets of county residents who died without
wills
. He was first appointed and then elected
Receiver of Taxes
of
Hempstead, New York
. He left this office to become a
town supervisor
in Hempstead and in 1977 he was elected presiding supervisor. He was also vice chairman of the Nassau County Board of Supervisors from 1977 to 1980.
Despite being a rather obscure candidate, he defeated incumbent Sen.
Jacob Javits
by 56% to 44% in the 1980 Republican
primary election
, after Javits' 1979 diagnosis of generally fatal
amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
. Javits nevertheless pursued the seat on the
Liberal Party
ticket,
splitting
the left-wing vote in ordinarily liberal New York with Democratic Congresswoman
Elizabeth Holtzman
and leading to D'Amato's 45%
plurality victory
. He was re-elected in 1986 and 1992, but lost in 1998.