12/29/2025 --axios
Former Democratic President Jimmy Carter has died at age 100, according to multiple reports. The big picture: As the nation's 39th president, Carter said he tried to forge a "competent and compassionate" U.S. government. A former peanut farmer and U.S. Navy nuclear physicist, Carter led a life of service that started well before his first elected office on the Sumter County, Georgia, Board of Education — and endured long after his presidency.He has often been called the "nation's greatest former president" for the humanitarian work he conducted in his more than four decades after Washington.Carter, the nation's longest-living former president and first to reach triple digits, began receiving hospice care at home in February 2023 after a series of short hospital stays, the Carter Center announced at the time. Flashback: Carter's wife of 77 years, Rosalynn, died in November 2023 at the age of 96. The former first lady, a lifelong mental health advocate, had been diagnosed with dementia earlier in the year and entered hospice days before her death.A 99-year-old Jimmy Carter traveled to Atlanta for her memorial service and attended her funeral in their hometown of Plains. President Biden and first lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and first gentleman Doug Emhoff, and former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton attended the Atlanta service.All living former first ladies — Melania Trump, Michelle Obama and Laura Bush — were also there.Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter had the longest presidential marriage, per AP. Carter greets people as he leaves after the funeral service for Rosalynn Carter at Maranatha Baptist Church on Nov. 29, 2023, in Plains, Ga. Photo: Alex Brandon/Pool/Getty ImagesLooking back on Carter’s lifeCarter was born on Oct. 1, 1924, in the small farming town of Plains, Georgia, at a hospital where his mother worked as a nurse. He was the first future president born in a hospital.Carter, the oldest of four, grew up picking peanuts on his family's farm. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1946, becoming the first future president to graduate from the academy. That same year he married Rosalynn, a fellow Plains native who had known Carter her entire life.Carter served in Norfolk, Virginia, and Hawai’i before joining the Navy's nuclear submarine program in Schenectady, New York, as a nuclear physicist. When his father died in 1953, Carter resigned to run the family's farms and seed and supply company with Rosalynn — against her wishes. Following a stint on his local Sumter County Board of Education, Carter ran for the Georgia State Senate in 1962. While he initially lost in the Democratic primary, he successfully proved his opponent had won based on voter fraud. A judge threw out the results, and Carter held the office for two terms. After a failed gubernatorial campaign in 1966, Carter was elected governor of Georgia in 1970. While his campaign sought the support of segregationists, his inaugural address shocked many when he declared "the time for discrimination is over." His administration emphasized ecology, efficiency in government and the removal of racial barriers. The Carters at an inaugural ball in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, 1977. The two were married for 77 years. Photo: Warren K Leffler/PhotoQuest/Getty ImagesCarter's presidential term Though largely unknown in national politics, Gov. Carter announced his candidacy for president in December 1974 and accepted the Democratic nomination in July 1976. (An Atlanta Constitution editorial declared: "Jimmy Carter is running for what!?")On Nov. 2, 1976 — during the country's bicentennial year — Carter and his running mate Walter Mondale defeated incumbent Republican President Gerald Ford.Carter's presidential victories included arranging the Camp David Accords that established a peace agreement between Egypt and Israel, the ratification of the Panama Canal treaties, and the normalization of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China.Under his administration, 8 million jobs were created and the budget deficit decreased. He championed environmental and renewable energy policies, had solar panels installed on the White House, protected more than 100 million acres of land in Alaska, and signed the Environmental Protection Agency's "Superfund" hazardous waste cleanup program into law.Carter championed a wave of industry deregulation including aviation, transportation and telecommunications, established the Department of Education, and appointed record numbers of women and people of color to government positions.But his term was marred by rising energy costs, climbing inflation and interest rates, and a struggle to negotiate the release of 52 Americans held hostage in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.In 2023, the New York Times confirmed that in 1980, allies of Carter's political opponent, former California Gov. Ronald Reagan, secretly urged Iran not to release the hostages until after the election — something Carter allies had long suspected. (The hostages were released minutes after Reagan's inauguration in 1981.)What he said: Carter often recalled how proud he was to have kept the U.S. out of war for his four years in office."We kept our country at peace. We never went to war. We never dropped a bomb. We never fired a bullet. But still we achieved our international goals," he told The Guardian in 2011. Carter in his hometown of Plains, Ga., following a press conference about receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. Photo: Steve Schaefer/AFP via Getty ImagesPost-presidencyAfter his defeat to Reagan in 1980, the Carters returned to Plains and the family peanut business, which had been run into debt while in a blind trust during his presidency.In 1982, he and Rosalynn founded the Atlanta-based Carter Center — which today houses his presidential library and an active, influential nongovernmental organization focused on "waging peace, fighting disease and building hope."The center has undertaken a broad range of global programs, including conflict negotiation, election monitoring, and funding treatments to eradicate diseases such as river blindness and Guinea worm.Carter was awarded the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to bring peace to international conflicts and advance democracy and human rights.From the end of his presidency until 2020, Carter regularly taught Sunday school at his home Baptist church, often with hundreds of people lining up overnight to attend. Since 1984, he and Rosalynn remained devoted to one of their favorite causes: volunteering for Habitat for Humanity, which builds and restores homes for individuals and families in need.In 2015, Carter told reporters that doctors had discovered a form of melanoma that spread to his brain. Remarkably, four months later he announced that he was cancer-free.In March 2019, at 94 years and 172 days, he became the longest-living former president in U.S. history. He and Rosalynn attended every presidential inauguration since his own in 1977 until 2021. President Biden and first lady Jill Biden visited the Carters in April 2021. Biden and Carter built a long-standing friendship over decades. (In 1976, the first presidential endorsement that then-Gov. Carter got from an elected official outside of Georgia came from a young Sen. Biden.)Carter leaves behind four children — John William (Jack), James Earl III (Chip), Donnel Jeffery (Jeff), and Amy — and more than two dozen grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
