John Edward Porter, who served for 10 terms as a member of the United States House of Representatives, has passed away at 87. Porter, a Republican, led bipartisan initiatives to ban the sale of assault weapons and to protect abortion rights. As chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee, Porter championed the effort to increase federal support of biomedical research, and in 1997 he was the first lawmaker to endorse the concept of doubling the budget of the National Institutes of Health within the span of a few years. Porter was the recipient of a Lasker Public Service Award in 2000; he was lauded for “wise and perceptive leadership on behalf of medical research funding and a deep commitment to strengthening the science enterprise.”
