Tom Daschle is the former Senator from South Dakota and the former majority leader of the U.S. Senate. Daschle is a Special Public Policy Advisor to the Washington D.C. law firm of Alston  & Bird.

Education:
Graduate of South Dakota State University, 1969

Background:
Born in Aberdeen, South Dakota, Senator Daschle attended South Dakota State University and graduated in 1969. Following college, he served for three years as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Air Force Strategic Command. After military service, he spent five years as an aide to South Dakota Senator James Abourezk.

Daschle served as a U.S. Congressman from January 3, 1979 till January 3, 1987. He then served in the U.S. Senate from 1987 till 2005. Daschle is an expert on health care policy and is the author with Scott S. Greenberger and Jeanne M. Lambrew of  Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis (Thomas Dunne Books, 2008). He is also the author with Michael D’Orso of  Like No Other Time: The 107th Congress and the Two Years that Changed America Forever ( Crown Publishers, 2003). Daschle was nominated by President Barack Obama to be the Secretary of Health and Human Services in 2009, but the nomination was withdrawn.