José Enrique Serrano

José Enrique Serrano (born October 24, 1943) is an American politician who was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1990 until his retirement in 2021. Serrano, a Democrat from New York, represented a district that is one of the smallest in the country geographically, consisting of a few square miles of the heavily populated South Bronx in New York City. His district was also one of the most densely populated and one of the few majority Hispanic districts in the country. The district was numbered the 18th from 1990 to 1993 and the 16th from 1993 to 2013, and the 15th district from 2013 to 2021. He was the longest-serving Hispanic-American in the House. He did not run for re-election in 2020 due to a diagnosis of Parkinson's disease, and Ritchie Torres was elected to succeed him.

Serrano was born in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico. At the age of seven, Serrano was taken by his family to The Bronx, where he was raised in the Millbrook Houses. Serrano went to Grace Dodge Vocational High School in the Bronx and briefly attended Lehman College in 1961. He served as a private in the 172nd Support Battalion of the United States Army Medical Corps from 1964 to 1966. Serrano was employed by Manufacturers Hanover Bank from 1961 to 1969, except for his military service, and served on New York City's District 7 School Board from 1969 to 1974. He was also chairman of the South Bronx Community Corporation and a delegate to the 1976 Democratic National Convention.

Serrano was a member of the New York State Assembly from 1975 to 1990, sitting in the 181st, 182nd, 183rd, 184th, 185th, 186th, 187th and 188th New York State Legislatures. His district was numbered the 75th until 1982, and the 73rd from 1983 on. He was Chairman of the Committee on Consumer Affairs (1979-1983), and the Committee on Education (1983-1990).

Elections

In 1990, Serrano won a special election for the seat vacated by resigning U.S. Congressman Robert García with 92% of the vote. He never won re-election with less than 92% of the vote in what is considered one of the safest seats in Congress.

In 2004, Serrano faced an electoral challenge from Jose Serrano, an unemployed former loading dockworker with the same name who eventually dropped out of the race in July.

Tenure

A member of the Progressive Caucus, Serrano was widely regarded as one of the most progressive members of Congress. He was questioned about his pork barrel spending by some fiscally conservative members of Congress. Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake once said of Serrano's $150,000 earmark to repair the roof at the city-owned Arthur Avenue Market (a historic indoor produce and prepared food market in the Bronx's "Little Italy"), "I would argue this is one cannoli the taxpayer doesn't want to take a bite of." Serrano replied to Flake, "The more you get up on these, sir, the more I realize that you do not know what you are talking about. I make no excuses about the fact that I earmark dollars to go in the poorest congressional district in the nation, which is situated in the richest city on earth."

On November 18, 2005, Serrano was one of three members of the House of Representatives to vote in favor of immediate withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. The other two votes were from Cynthia McKinney of Georgia and Robert Wexler of Florida.

In 1997 [HJR 19], 1999 [HJR 17], 2001 [HJR 4], 2003 [HJR 11], 2005 [HJR 9], 2007 [HJR 8], 2009 [HJR 5], 2011 [HJR 17], and 2013 [HJR 15], Serrano introduced a joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to repeal the 22nd Amendment, thereby removing presidential term limits. Each resolution died without ever getting past the committee.

Serrano paid attention to local environmental issues in New York, with a particular focus on constructing greenways, acquiring parklands, and cleaning up the Bronx River, which ran through his district.Recently a beaver was discovered swimming in the river for the first time in 200 years, something seen as a testament to his efforts.In 2007, he engineered the purchase of the last privately owned island in New York harbor—South Brother Island—for preservation in perpetuity by the City of New York as a wildlife refuge for rare shorebirds.

Serrano was one of three New York-area congressmen on the House Appropriations Committee, the others being Nita Lowey of the 18th district and Grace Meng of the 6th district. At the end of his tenure, he was the ranking member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services, having previously served as the chair.As chairman, he successfully engineered the inclusion of language in the 2007 omnibus spending bill that guaranteed the extension of the 50 State Quarters program to include the minting of six additional quarters to honor the District of Columbia and the five United States territories, including Serrano's native Puerto Rico.

Serrano advocated for Puerto Ricans under FBI prosecution. In May 2000, he brokered an agreement with then-FBI Director Louis Freeh, then-Puerto Rican Independence Party Electoral Commissioner Manuel Rodríguez Orellana and then-Puerto Rico Senate Federal Affairs Committee chairman (and future Puerto Rico Senate President and Secretary of State) Kenneth McClintock that resulted in the release of nearly 100,000 pages of previously secret FBI files on Puerto Rican political activists.

Serrano was a critic of the Bush administration's approach to handling President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. In 2005, while the Venezuelan President was in New York City speaking before the United Nations, the congressman invited him to his district to speak to his constituency. After Chávez' death, Serrano published condolences via Twitter, describing him as a leader who "understood the needs of the poor" and was "committed to empowering the powerless". Serrano's tweet prompted a response from the Republican National Committee, which asserted that it was "simply insulting that a Democrat Congressman would praise the authoritarian ruler Hugo Chávez".

Serrano criticized Brazil's president Jair Bolsonaro. In March 2019, he and 29 other Democratic lawmakers wrote a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that read in part, "Since the election of far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro as president, we have been particularly alarmed by the threat Bolsonaro’s agenda poses to the LGBTQ+ community and other minority communities, women, labor activists, and political dissidents in Brazil".

In March 2019, Serrano announced that he would not seek re-election in 2020 because he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

Committee assignments

• Committee on Appropriations
  • Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies
  • Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government (Ranking Member)
  • Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies

Caucus memberships

• Congressional Hispanic Caucus
• Congressional Progressive Caucus.
• International Conservation Caucus
• Congressional Arts Caucus
• Afterschool Caucuses
• United States Congressional International Conservation Caucus

Party leadership

• Senior Whip

Serrano's son, José M. Serrano, is a member of the New York State Senate. In addition to José Jr, Serrano has four other children.

In March 2019, Serrano announced that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and would not seek re-election in 2020.