Bill Clinton

42nd US President William (Bill) Jefferson Blythe III (Clinton), William (Bill) Jefferson Blythe III (Clinton) was born on August 19, 1946 in Hope, Arkansas.

William's (Bill's) father died in a car accident a few months before his son was born. His mother remarried Roger Clinton (Roger Clinton). Subsequently, Bill took his last name.

Clinton entered Georgetown University, graduating in 1968 with a bachelor's degree in international relations.

In 1968, Clinton received a Rhodes scholarship to study at Oxford University. After returning to the United States, Clinton entered Yale Law School, graduating in 1973.

At Yale, Clinton met his future wife, Hillary Rodham, and they were engaged in educational and political activities together.

After graduating from university, Clinton returned to Arkansas, and until 1976 taught at the law school of the University of Arkansas.

In 1974, he ran for Congress from Arkansas as a Democratic candidate, but lost the election.

In 1975, Bill Clinton married Hillary. In February 1980, Bill and Hillary Clinton had a daughter, Chelsea Clinton.

In 1976, Clinton was elected to the post of Attorney General and Attorney General of Arkansas. The main direction of his work was the fight against monopoly companies and their influence on state power.

In 1978, he won the state gubernatorial election and became the youngest governor in US history. Defeated in the next election by Republican rival Frank White, Clinton launched a self-rehabilitation campaign, and in the 1982 election became the first governor in Arkansas history to win the office again after a defeat.

After returning to the governor's post, Clinton reformed the standards of the state education system (the government committee on these issues was headed by Hillary Clinton).

In 1984, Clinton again won the gubernatorial election, and in 1986 became the first Arkansas governor since Reconstruction after the Civil War, elected to a four-year term. In 1990 he was again re-elected.

In 1990, Clinton headed the Democratic Leadership Council, an organization that advocated a shift in the party's position towards the political center.

In 1991, Bill Clinton announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States. Clinton's campaign strategy was based on the allegations that during the period of Republican dominance, the national economy of the United States fell into a state of stagnation.

In the 1992 election, he defeated incumbent George W. Bush and populist billionaire Ross Perot as an independent to become the 42nd President of the United States.

During the Clinton presidency, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed, the Dayton Peace Accords to resolve the Balkan conflict and the Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement in Oslo were signed. In 1993, an operation by US forces to restore order in Somalia ended in failure.

In 1996, Clinton was re-elected for a second presidential term. During this period, the United States pursued a tough foreign policy line. Clinton acted as an active supporter of NATO expansion, the alliance approved the admission of new members - Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic. After Iraq refused to cooperate with international weapons inspectors in 1998, the United States launched air strikes on the territory of this country.

As a result of the NATO operation against Yugoslavia, in June 1999, Yugoslav troops were withdrawn from Kosovo, UN peacekeeping forces (Kosovo Peace Implementation Force, Kfor) and military personnel of NATO countries were sent to the province.

Leaving the presidency in January 2001, Clinton delivered a farewell address to the nation. He listed the achievements of his administration: rising living standards, reducing the number of crimes and improving the environmental situation.

Clinton became the first US President from the Democratic Party in the last 60 years, who was twice elected to the presidency of the country.

After the end of his presidential term, Bill Clinton founded his own charitable public foundation (William J. Clinton Foundation), which deals with health issues and the fight against AIDS, the economy and global climate change, the problem of childhood obesity, etc.

In 2004, Clinton's memoirs, My Life, were published and became a bestseller.

In May 2009, Bill Clinton accepted the invitation of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and became the UN special envoy for Haiti (U.N. special envoy for Haiti).

The former president supported his wife Hillary, who began an independent political career and later became US Secretary of State.

Clinton is actively involved in social and charitable activities, speaking at public events around the world.

In 2005, he led a nationwide fundraising campaign with former President George W. Bush to help victims of Hurricane Katrina. In January 2010, after the devastating earthquake in Haiti, Clinton, along with George W. Bush, at the initiative of President Obama, who allocated $ 100 million from the state budget for assistance, led the relief fund.

In July 2011, Bill Clinton donated $1.25 million in financial assistance to Haiti for the development of the education system. Haitian President Michel Martelly presented Bill Clinton with the National Order of Honor and Merit.