Maurice Robert "Mike" Gravel (/ɡrəˈvɛl/ grə-VELL; May 13, 1930 – June 26, 2021) was an American politician and writer who represented Alaska in the United States Senate from 1969 to 1981 as a member of the Democratic Party.

Born and raised in Springfield, Massachusetts, by French-Canadian immigrant parents, Gravel moved to Alaska in the late 1950s, becoming a real estate developer and entering politics.

He conducted an unsuccessful campaign for the Democratic nomination in 1972 for Vice President of the United States, and then played a crucial role in obtaining Congressional approval for the Trans-Alaska pipeline in 1973.

[3] Journalist I. F. Stone and philosopher Bertrand Russell strongly influenced Gravel in their willingness to challenge assumptions and oppose social convention and political authority.

[16] While he expected to be sent off to the Korean War when he graduated as a second lieutenant in early 1952, he was instead assigned to Stuttgart, West Germany, as a Special Adjutant in the Army's Communications Intelligence Service.

[nb 1] Alaska had very crowded primaries that year: Gravel was one of 33 Democrats, along with 21 Republicans, who were running for the chance to compete for the 14 House seats allocated to the 8th district.

[49] A late appearance by anti-war presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy did not offset Gruening's lack of funds and endorsements; meanwhile, Gravel and Rasmuson both saturated local media with their filmed biographies.

[22] In retrospective assessment, University of Alaska Anchorage history professor Stephen Haycox said, "Loose cannon is a good description of Gravel's Senate career.

[nb 2] In 1971, Gravel voted against the Nixon administration's proposed anti-ballistic missile system, the Safeguard Program, having previously vacillated over the issue, suggesting that he might be willing to support it in exchange for federal lands in Alaska being opened up for private oil drilling.

[39] Nuclear power was considered an environmentally clean alternative for commercial generation of electricity and was part of a popular national policy for the peaceful use of atomic energy in the 1950s and 1960s.

[72] Skeptics such as Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John Stennis thought this unrealistic and wanted a four-year extension,[74] but the two-year proposal is what went forward in Congress.

[82] On August 5, the Nixon administration pleaded for a renewal before the Senate went on recess, but Gravel blocked Stennis's attempt to limit debate, and no vote was held.

[84] The papers were a large collection of secret government documents and studies pertaining to the Vietnam War, of which former Defense Department analyst Daniel Ellsberg had made unauthorized copies and was determined to make public.

[90] Worried his home might be raided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Gravel smuggled the report (which filled two large suitcases) into his congressional office, which was then guarded by disabled Vietnam veterans.

[100] Gravel made excerpts from the study public,[101] but senators Robert P. Griffin and William B. Saxbe blocked his attempt to read NSSM 1 into the Congressional Record.

Likely presidential nominee George McGovern was in fact already considering the unusual move of naming three or four acceptable vice-presidential candidates and letting the delegates choose.

[119] Gray allegedly wanted to secure Gravel's support for further funding for construction of the National Visitor Center in Washington, a troubled project that was under the jurisdiction of subcommittees that both members chaired.

On July 17, 1973, in what the New York Times termed a "nip-and-tuck roll-call", the Gravel amendment was approved, as a 49–49 tie was broken in favor by Vice President Spiro Agnew.

[53][132] Later, his views changed; in the early 1970s Gravel supported a demonstration project that established links between Alaskan villages and the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, for medical diagnostic communications.

Subsequently, Gravel proposed a never-built "Denali City" development above the Tokositna River near the mountain, to consist of a giant Teflon dome enclosing hotels, golf courses, condominiums, and commercial buildings.

[20] Another factor may have been Alaska's blanket primary system of the time,[148] which allowed unlimited voting across party lines and from its many independents;[146] Republicans believed Gruening would be an easier candidate to defeat in the general election.

[184] Like some of the other second-tier candidates, Gravel did not get as much time as the leaders; during the June 2, 2007, New Hampshire debate, which lasted two hours, he was asked 10 questions and allowed to speak for five minutes and 37 seconds.

"[210] The following day Gravel entered the race for the 2008 Libertarian presidential nomination,[212] saying that he would have run as a third-party candidate all along except that he needed the public exposure that came from being in the earlier Democratic debates.

He praised Palin's record in standing up to corruption among Alaskan Republicans, thought her national inexperience was an asset rather than a detriment, and predicted that the "Troopergate" investigation into whether she improperly fired a state official would "come out in her favor".

[226] Gravel noted that the conference was attended by "various elements of extremes" but said it was necessary to discuss how the U.S. film industry portrayed Iran in order to prevent "an insane war" between the two nations.

[155][237] Intrigued by the group's commitment to amplifying his long-held policy goals, Gravel (who would be 90 years, 8 months old on Inauguration Day in 2021) said he planned to meet with them in April, and to discuss a 2020 White House run with his wife.

"[155] In June 2019, Gravel touted the endorsement of Muntadher al-Zaidi, the Iraqi journalist who, in December 2008, made headlines after he threw his shoes at President George W. Bush in protest of the U.S. war in Iraq.

[138][57][46] As a result, on the delay in burials induced by the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, Gravel was later laid to rest on June 20, 2023, at Arlington National Cemetery where his cremated remains were buried.

[57] The obituary in The Washington Post was similar, saying that Gravel was "an Alaska Democrat with a flair for the theatrical who rose from obscurity to brief renown" and later "ran quixotic campaigns for the presidency".

[171][172] Gravel believed that NAFTA was the "root cause" of illegal migration to the U.S.[172] He favored a guest worker program and "setting up naturalization procedures that would fairly bring immigrants into legal status".