<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nov. 10, 1949\u2013April 19, 2022 <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It wasn\u2019t uncommon for Brad Ashford \u201971 to cross a line, but not in the way you might think. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Nebraska senator, who died on April 19 at age 72, made a name for himself as an \u201cindependent-minded moderate,\u201d according to the Associated Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Throughout this decades-long career, he\u2019d change parties four times and tout his ability to cross party lines with the issues he supported. \u201cBrad didn\u2019t let political parties bother him too much,\u201d state Sen. John McCollister told KMTV. McCollister was also Ashford\u2019s high school classmate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At Colgate, Ashford was a history major who earned Phi Beta Kappa distinction and was a member of the London History Study Group. While he was a student, he interned for Republican Sen. Roman Hruska of Nebraska, getting his first taste of politics. Friend and classmate Dan Cattau \u201972 remembers Ashford for his detail-oriented nature: \u201cWe were both history majors, and it probably is no surprise, given his policy wonk nature, that he took meticulous notes in the heavy-lecture courses, and then retyped them perfectly. This made him quite popular when it came to finals. Instead of studying the night before exams, we took Brad out for pizza and beer \u2014 and he generously shared his notes. Everyone won.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ashford went on to earn his juris doctor from Creighton University in Omaha, cementing his post-grad residency in the state. A fifth-generation Nebraskan with a passion for public service, Ashford dedicated his life to making the Cornhusker State a better place for residents. Soon after graduating from law school, he began working as a lawyer for the Federal Highway Administration before opening his own practice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n His political career started in the 1980s with service in the Nebraska legislature from 1987\u201395 and 2007\u201315. His accomplishments also include serving as executive director of the Omaha Housing Authority, which developed 300 public housing units during his tenure. In 2014, he fulfilled a lifelong dream and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. He made the most of his two years in office, including introducing a bill that was later signed into law establishing a pilot program on partnership agreements to construct new facilities for the Department of Veterans Affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n True to his cross-party nature, he later worked alongside Republican Don Bacon, to whom he lost his House of Representatives seat in 2016, to gain federal funding for an initiative supporting victims of gun violence. \u201cHe was a friend first, a partisan last,\u201d former Nebraska governor and U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson told the Omaha World-Herald<\/em>, \u201cand Omaha and the state of Nebraska were always tops with Brad.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ashford is survived by his wife, Ann; three children; and a granddaughter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe was positive through the end,\u201d his family wrote on Facebook following his death, \u201cand would want you to take today and every day to give yourself a pat on the back for a job well done, tell your loved ones you love them, read some history to learn something, and reach out to lift up your fellow human.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Remembering Brad Ashford \u201971<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1263,"featured_media":9868,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2,14],"tags":[296,165,95,509,1091],"coauthors":[158],"class_list":["post-9852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-alumni-spotlights","category-alumni-updates","category-in-tribute","tag-government","tag-history","tag-politics","tag-public-service","tag-senator"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-2yU","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2022\/08\/BradAshfordResize.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1263"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9852"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10033,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9852\/revisions\/10033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9852"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}