Reno, Janet (1938-2016), was the first woman to serve as attorney general of the United States. Reno, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, held the Cabinet post from 1993 to 2001.
As U.S. attorney general, Reno made several decisions that were regarded as controversial. The first involved a 51-day stand-off between federal law-enforcement agents and a cult called the Branch Davidians at the cult’s compound near Waco, Texas. The stand-off had begun in February 1993 when the agents attempted to arrest the cult’s leader, David Koresh, because the group had a large stock of high-powered weapons. In April, Reno authorized the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to use tear gas to try to drive the cult members from their compound. A fire broke out, apparently set by cult members, and more than 80 people died, including Koresh.
A major controversy erupted in late 1999 over custody of a 6-year-old Cuban shipwreck survivor named Elian Gonzalez. Elian’s relatives in Miami, Florida, applied for political asylum for the boy. But Elian’s father demanded that the child be returned to him in Cuba. In April 2000, at Reno’s direction, armed federal agents seized Elian, enforcing a government order that the boy be returned to his father.
Reno also faced the problem of deciding when to order independent investigations of suspected wrongdoing by government officials rather than have her Department of Justice do the investigating. In some cases, she approved independent investigations. For example, she appointed an independent special prosecutor to look into charges about Whitewater, a business deal in which Clinton was involved before he became president. She also approved an investigation into whether Clinton had lied under oath and committed other offenses related to an alleged affair with a White House intern. For more details, see Clinton, Bill (Domestic events) . But Reno rejected demands by Republican leaders for an independent investigation of charges about Democratic fund-raising practices.
Reno was born in Miami on July 21, 1938. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and a law degree from Harvard University. She practiced law in Miami. In 1972, Reno ran for a seat in the Florida legislature, but lost. She then joined the state attorney office of Dade County (now Miami-Dade County) as a prosecutor. She was appointed state attorney in 1978 and elected to the office in November of that year. Reno was the first woman to be elected to the office. She won reelection four times.
In 2001, Reno announced that she would seek the 2002 Democratic nomination for governor of Florida. Jeb Bush—a Republican and U.S. President George W. Bush’s brother—had been serving as Florida’s governor since 1999. However, Reno failed to gain the nomination, losing in Florida’s primary elections in 2002 in an extremely close contest. Reno died on Nov. 7, 2016.
