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Jon Stevens Corzine (born January 1, 1947) is an American politician and businessman. He is a member of the Democratic Party and is currently a United States Senator from New Jersey serving from 2001 to 2007.
Born in central Illinois, Corzine grew up on a small family farm near Taylorville, Illinois. After completing high school, he applied to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for his undergraduate degree and graduated in 1969. While in college, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves and served until 1975, rising to the rank of sergeant. After his active duty in 1970, he enrolled in the University of Chicago graduate business school. By 1973, he received his MBA, which launched him into his business career.
His first experience in business was a job at Bank Ohio, a regional bank in Columbus, Ohio. He worked there until 1975 when he moved his family to New Jersey. There he was hired as a bond trader for Goldman Sachs. Over the years, he worked his way up to Chairman and CEO of the company in 1994 and successfully converted the investment firm from a small private partnership to a worldwide publicly traded corporation. He received numerous awards and recognition for his job including being in the TIME magazine Top 50 Technology Executives in 1997.
After leaving Goldman Sachs in 1999, Corzine campaigned for one of New Jersey's Senate Seats after Frank Lautenberg announced his retirement. Even though he spent $62,802,999 on his campaign (the most expensive Senate campaign in US history), Corzine was elected to the Senate by a narrow margin over his Republican opponent Bob Franks in November 2000 and was sworn into the Senate in January 2001.
In the Senate, Corzine is a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and the U.S. Senate Committee on Budget. He is a supporter of introducing legislation that reforms the 401 (k) plan to minimize the risk of investment portfolios. He is a sponsor of the Start Healthy, Stay Healthy Act which expands health care coverage for children and pregnant women. The Senator supported providing a two-year tax break to September 11 Terrorist Attack victims to help them recover financially and help grant citizenship to victims that were documented aliens. He also supports restrictive gun control laws, outlawing racial profiling, and Amtrak subsidies.