Dianne Feinstein’s frailty, fight for family millions cast shadow on final Senate chapter
SAN FRANCISCO — One of the great political careers in modern American history began in earnest in a singular moment in 1978, when then-San Francisco Board of Supervisors President Dianne Feinstein showed fortitude in the face of horror.
Announcing that two of her colleagues — Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk — had been assassinated at City Hall, Feinstein was composed and authoritative despite having just borne witness to the bloodshed. So clear was her gravitas — all the more striking in an era of rampant misogyny — that she would use video of herself from that day in later campaign ads.
Nearly half a century later, she is 90 years old, frail and at times forgetful. None of her former strength is apparent. What abounds instead, at least publicly, is a sense of dissolution — not only of a distinguished political career, but also of her family’s vast fortune and her family itself.
Supporters might have hoped Feinstein’s last chapter in power after 30 years in the U.S. Senate would have buttressed her legacy as a savvy political power broker, but the long farewell has been far from graceful. She is cloistered away from the public when not being prodded into action for brief votes, and is surrounded by a phalanx of defensive aides whenever members of the media approach. In the resulting vacuum of information about the senator’s capabilities and coherence, little is known except her evident decline.
That has been especially true since Feinstein’s frailty became fodder for a family squabble — public for all to see in court filings — over the vast fortune left behind by Feinstein’s late husband Richard Blum, who died last year.
Over the last few months,
