Jimmy Carter, former US president dies aged 100

• ABC: Jimmy Carter, the former US president who became a crusader for human rights and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in later life, has died aged 100, according to his son Chip.

Mr Carter, who served as the 39th US president between 1977 and 1981, had been receiving hospice care at his home in Plains, Georgia since February 2023, according to the Carter Center, a not-for-profit body he set up to advance human rights.

Mr Carter lived longer after leaving the White House than any other ex-president but suffered failing health in later years, including a melanoma that spread to his liver and brain.

Until mid-2020, four decades after he left office, he was still teaching at Sunday school twice a month in his tiny hometown.

Prior to his centennial celebration, Carter said he was “only trying to make it to vote for Kamala Harris”, grandson Jason Carter told Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

He achieved that wish on October 16, with the Carter Center confirming he had voted by mail.

A one-term president, Carter was arguably more influential, effective and admired as a leader after he left office.

When Americans voted a peanut farmer from the deep south into the White House, it was described as the closest they had come to randomly picking a name out of the phone book.

However, after the Vietnam War and Watergate scandal, they longed for an honest outsider.

Mr Carter — a quietly spoken former Georgia governor with a radiant smile — seemed like the man for the time, introducing himself at the 1976 Democratic convention with the simple line: “My name is Jimmy Carter and I’m running for president.”

“We want to have faith again. We want to be proud again. We just want the truth again,” he said.

The surprise Democrat candidate stunned pundits in winning the presidency with his centrist message and brilliant campaign, promising: “I’ll never tell a lie. I’ll never avoid a controversial issue.”

Born James Earl Carter Jr, the future president grew upin the tiny town of Plains. As a young man he joined the US Navy and served in the elite nuclear submarine program, but resigned after the sudden death of his father, and returned to Plains to run the family peanut farm.

He became a state senator in 1963 and was governor of Georgia from 1971 to 1975.

Having been raised in segregated rural Georgia, Mr Carter’s politics were influenced by the civil rights era.

“The time of racial discrimination is over,” he declared at his inauguration as governor.

And, by the time he ascended to the White House, he had established himself as a politician with progressive values.

He beat Gerald Ford — successor to the disgraced Richard Nixon — at the 1976 presidential election, two years after the climax of the Watergate affair.

There were successes in office: a historic peace deal between Israel and Egypt and an arms control treaty with the Soviet Union.

However, his time in office is better remembered for the events that overwhelmed it: inflation, a global energy crisis, war in Afghanistan and the US hostage crisis in Iran.

The capture of US embassy staff in Tehran by revolutionaries, and the failed rescue mission that ensued, dominated the final year of the Carter administration and contributed hugely to his defeat by Ronald Reagan in 1980.

But his tireless work for humanity after his presidency saw him receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.

He set up the non-governmental, not-for-profit Carter Center to advance human rights, advocating his enduring belief that conflicts must be solved by mediation and cooperation.

“Our commitment to human rights must be absolute,” he said.

With his wife, Rosalynn, he was a volunteer, helping the needy at home and abroad.

Rosalynn died on November 19, 2023 at the age of 96 after living with dementia. 

“She gave me wise guidance and encouragement when I needed it,” Mr Carter said in a statement.

“As long as Rosalynn was in the world, I always knew somebody loved and supported me.”

They were married for 78 years, having wed in 1946 when he was 21 and she was 18.

Advertise with the mоѕt vіѕіtеd nеwѕ ѕіtе іn Antigua!
We offer fully customizable and flexible digital marketing packages.
Contact us at [email protected]