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Rep. Tom Lantos, IRC board member and overseer, dies at 80

Rep. Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever elected to the U.S. Congress, died from complications of cancer Feb. 11, 2008, at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland.  He was 80.

George Rupp, president of the International Rescue Committee, hailed Rep. Lantos’s achievements:

“Tom Lantos was a staunch defender of human rights the world over.  He fought vigorously for the cause of freedom and was a particularly effective advocate for refugees who fled religious, political or ethnic persecution.  The International Rescue Committee is proud to have had him as a member of our board of directors from 1989 to 2004 and as an IRC overseer for the last four years. ” 

Rep. Lantos had represented the Bay Area of California in Congress since 1981.  He was the founding co-chairman of the 24-year-old Congressional Human Rights Caucus, which his wife, Annette, directed as a volunteer since its inception.

He is survived, in addition to his wife, by their two daughters, Annette and Katrina, 18 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.