Former US President and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jimmy Carter has died at the age of 100.

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Jimmy Carter, a Georgia peanut farmer who struggled as a U.S. president with a bad economy and the Iran hostage crisis but brokered peace between Israel and Egypt and later won the Nobel Peace Prize for his humanitarian work, has died at his home. The Carter Center said Sunday in Plains, Georgia. He was 100.

“My father was a hero not only to me, but to all who believe in peace, human rights and selfless love,” said Chip Carter, the former president’s son. “My brothers, my sister and I share these common beliefs with the rest of the world. The world is our family in the way it brought people together, and we thank you for honoring his memory by living these shared beliefs.

The Carter Center said there will be public events in Atlanta and Washington. These events will be followed by personal intervention in Plains, he said.

According to the Centre, final arrangements for a state funeral for the former president are still pending.

Jimmy Carter, Democrat, After defeating Republican President Gerald Ford (NYSE: ) in the 1976 US election, he served as president from January 1977 to January 1981. Carter was swept from office after four years in a landslide as voters rejected Republican challenger Ronald Reagan, the former actor and California governor.

Carter lived longer than any other US president. Along the way, he earned a reputation as a better ex-president than he was – a status he immediately recognized.

His one-term presidency was marked by the 1978 Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt, which brought some stability to the Middle East. But he was embarrased by the economic downturn, continued unpopularity and the Iran hostage crisis, which consumed his final 444 days in office.

In recent years, Carter has had several health problems, including melanoma that spread to his liver and brain. Carter decided to accept hospice care in February 2023 rather than undergo further medical intervention. His wife, Rosalyn Carter, died on November 19, 2023, aged 96. He appeared frail as he attended her memorial service and funeral, confined to a wheelchair.

Although it is unknown whether Carter left office, he worked tirelessly on humanitarian issues for decades. In the year He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his “untiring efforts to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, promote democracy and human rights, and promote economic and social progress.”

When Carter moved into the White House as the 39th president of the United States, he had populist tendencies as governor of Georgia. In the year He was a Washington expatriate in 1974, when America was still reeling from the Watergate scandal that forced Republican Richard Nixon to resign and promoted Ford to vice president.

“I’m Jimmy Carter and I’m running for president. I’ll never lie to you,” Carter promised, grinning from ear to ear.

In a 1991 documentary to assess his presidency, Carter said: “My biggest failure was a political failure. I was never able to convince the American people that I was a strong, strong leader.”

Despite his troubles in office, Carter had few rivals for his success as a former president. As a tireless advocate for human rights, a voice for the disenfranchised, and a leader in the fight against hunger and poverty, he has earned unearned respect in the White House.

Carter He received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his efforts to promote human rights and resolve conflicts around the world, from Ethiopia and Eritrea to Bosnia and Haiti. His Carter Center in Atlanta has sent international election monitoring delegations to elections around the world.

A Southern Baptist Sunday school teacher since his teens, Carter was outspoken about his religious beliefs and brought a strong sense of morality to the presidency. At his inauguration in 1977, he sought to take some swagger from his increasingly imperial presidency, where he had to walk rather than ride in a limousine.

The Middle East has been a focus of Carter’s (NYSE: ) foreign policy. In the year The 1978 Camp David Peace Accords between Egypt and Israel ended hostilities between the two neighbors.

Carter brought Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland for talks. Later, when the deal seemed to have been resolved, Carter saved the day by flying a private shuttle to Cairo and Jerusalem for diplomacy.

The agreement stipulates that the Israelis withdraw from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula and establish diplomatic relations. Begin and Sadat each won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978.

In the year In the 1980 election, the main issues were double-digit inflation, interest rates above 20%, and soaring gas prices, as well as the Iranian hostage crisis, which was embarrassing for the United States. These issues damaged Carter’s presidency and cost him a second term.

Hostage crisis

In the year On November 4, 1979, revolutionaries loyal to Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini stormed the American embassy in Tehran, arrested the Americans present, and demanded the return of the exiled Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was being treated by the United States. American Hospital.

The American people initially rallied behind Carter. But support faded when a commando raid failed to rescue the hostages in April 1980, when eight American soldiers died in a plane crash in the Iranian desert.

Carter’s final humiliation was Iran’s release of the 52 hostages on January 20, 1981, minutes after Carter was sworn in to replace them on the plane carrying them.

In another crisis, Carter In 1979, the former Soviet Union opposed the invasion of Afghanistan. In addition, the US Senate called for a delay in the nuclear weapons agreement with Moscow.

Undaunted, the Soviets remained in Afghanistan for ten years.

In 1978, Carter narrowly won Senate approval for a deal to transfer control of the Panama Canal to Panama. The United States has also completed negotiations on full relations with China.

Carter created two new US cabinet departments – Education and Labor. He urged the country to embrace protectionism, saying America’s “energy crisis” is the “moral equivalent of war” amid soaring gas prices. In the year In 1977, he told Americans, “Ours is the most wasteful nation on earth.”

In the year In 1979, Carter delivered what became known as his “no order” speech, although he never used the term.

“After listening to the American people, I’m reminded again that all the laws in the world can’t fix what’s wrong with America,” he said in a televised speech.

“The threat is invisible in conventional ways. It is a crisis of confidence. It is a crisis that touches the heart and soul and spirit of our national will. The erosion of our faith in the future threatens to destroy society. And the American political structure.”

As president, the cantankerous Carter was embarrassed by the behavior of his hard-drinking younger brother, Billy Carter, who boasted, “I got Red Neck, White Socks, and Blue Ribbon Beer.”

‘Go again’

Jimmy Carter had fended off a challenge from Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy for the 1980 Democratic presidential nomination, but was politically facing a strong Republican opponent heading into a general election battle.

Reagan, a conservative who had projected an image of strength, challenged Carter in his arguments before the November 1980 election.

“There you go again,” Reagan said to Carter when his Republican rival felt the president had misrepresented Reagan’s views during a debate.

Carter He lost to Reagan in the 1980 election, winning 44 of the 50 states and collecting an Electoral College landslide.

James Earl Carter Jr. was born on October 1, 1924 in Plains, Georgia, one of four children of a farmer and a storekeeper. In the year He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1946, served in the nuclear submarine program and left to run the family peanut farm business.

In 1946, he married his wife Rosaline, a union he called “the most important thing in my life.” They had three sons and one daughter.

Carter became a millionaire, Georgia state legislator and governor of Georgia from 1971 to 1975. He made a low bid for the 1976 Democratic presidential nomination and edged out his rivals for the right to face Ford in the general election.

With Walter Mondale as his vice presidential running mate, Carter was aided by a major Ford gaffe during a debate. “There is no Soviet hegemony in Eastern Europe and there never will be under Ford’s administration,” Ford said.

Although Ford won more states, Carter beat Ford in the election – 27 to Carter’s 23.

Not all of Carter’s post-presidential work has been acclaimed. Former President George W. Bush and his father, former President George H.W. Bush, both Republicans, reportedly resented Carter’s freelance diplomacy in Iraq and elsewhere.

In the year In 2004, Carter Calling the George W. Bush administration “the worst in history,” Vice President Dick Cheney called it “a disaster for our country.”

In the year In 2019, Carter questioned the legitimacy of Republican Donald Trump’s presidency, saying he was “put in office because the Russians interfered on his behalf.” Trump responded by calling Carter a “terrible president.”

Carter also traveled to communist North Korea. In the year A visit in 1994 ended the nuclear crisis, with President Kim Il Sung agreeing to renegotiate with the United States to end its nuclear program. In return for aid, North Korea has promised not to restart its nuclear reactor or remediate the reactor’s spent fuel.

But Carter angered the administration of Democratic President Bill Clinton by announcing the deal with North Korea’s leader without checking with Washington.

In the year In 2010, Carter won the release of an American sentenced to eight years of hard labor for illegally entering North Korea.

Carter has written more than two dozen books, ranging from presidential memoirs to children’s books and poetry, as well as about religious faith and diplomacy. His book “Faith: A Journey for All” was published in 2018.

(Reporting and writing by Will Dunham; Additional reporting by Jasper Ward, Bill Trott, Diane Craft and Editing by Lisa Shumaker)