Getty Darwin Lange attends Heidi Heitkamp's swearing-in ceremony
Heidi Heitkamp is the Democratic US senator from North Dakota. Heitkamp recently made national headlines and drew sharp criticism from many in her own state when she decided to vote “no” for Brett Kavanaugh. Kavanaugh was sworn in on Saturday as the ninth justice on the Supreme Court, after a hard-fought nomination process. Ever since her vote, Heitkamp has been falling in the polls; she now trails her Republican challenger, Kevin Cramer, by double digits.
Heitkamp has said that she voted against Kavanaugh even though she knew that it was probably going to hurt her, politically. “I don’t think there’s any doubt about that. I think that the politically expedient vote here was a ‘yes’ vote,” Heitkamp said. She said she believed “100 percent” that Kavanaugh assaulted Christine Ford when they were both in high school.
Heitkamp is married to Darwin Lange, her college sweetheart. They live in Mandan, North Dakota.
Here’s what you need to know about Darwin Lange:
1. Heitkamp Described Lange as a ‘Shy Farm Boy’
In an interview with C-Span back in 2014, Heitkamp spoke with great affection about her husband, describing him as a “shy farm boy.” She said, “he doesn’t like the limelight, doesn’t like being out there. Very very shy.” You can watch the full interview here.
But she added that Lange, who is “very bright” and could have become a surgeon or a researcher, chose to go into family medicine, a career which requires a lot of interaction. And, she said, over the years Lange’s interpersonal skills have increased, to the point that his patients love him. She said that Lange didn’t move to DC when she became a senator, because his patients didn’t want him to leave them behind.
2. Lange and Heitkamp Met in College, but She Didn’t Like Him at First
Darwin Lange
Heitkamp and Lange met in college; they both got their undergraduate degrees at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks. Lange went on to medical school at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine, also in Grand Forks.
Lange was a friend of Heitkamp’s roommate. Heitkamp says that she didn’t like Lange at first. She told C-SPAN that when they first met, he was pretty critical about some experimental woven art she was making; that put a crimp in their relationship. But over time, they got to know each other better, and their relationship changed.
The couple married when Heitkamp was 31. Lange was working as a rural practitioner in Mandan, North Dakota and Heitkamp soon found work as a state tax commissioner.
3. Lange and Heitkamp Have Two Grown Children
Lange and Heitkamp live in Mandan, North Dakota. They have two grown children — a daughter named Alethea, 33, and a son named Nathan, 28.
Mandan, the eighth largest city in North Dakota, was founded in 1881. The city’s slogan is “Where the West Begins,” and Mandan takes great pride in its history, its culture, and its “rugged and hearty nature.” Mandan has a population of 131,635.
4. Lange Has Worked at North Dakota’s Largest Rural Clinic Since 1985
Heitkamp has described her husband as a shy, steady man, so it should come as no surprise that he’s been working for the same clinic ever since her completed his residency, in 1985.
Lange did his residency at the University of North Dakota Center for Family Medicine in Bismarck, North Dakota. After that, he went to work for the Sanford North Medicine Clinic.
Sanford Health describes itself as “an integrated health system headquartered in the Dakotas.” According to the Sanford website, it is “the largest rural, not-for-profit health care system in the nation with 45 hospitals and 289 clinics in nine states and three countries.” The clinic has more than 28,000 employees, with over 1,300 physicians. Sanford Health is the largest employer in the Dakotas.
5. Lange’s Friends Describe Him as Smart but Laid Back
One of Lange’s oldest friends, Grand Forks mayor Mike Brown, said that Lange wore a baseball cap all through medical school. The cap annoyed one of their professors, who made a deal with Lange that he would take off the cap as soon as the professor could stump him with a question. Brown said that the professor “would ask Darwin questions and keep asking until Darwin would take off the cap. But Darwin just kept answering the questions.”
Brown added that the other students in the class would get “discouraged” watching Lange, who seemed to find everything so easy.
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