Arizona Senator and former Republican presidential nominee John McCain died Saturday, a day after announcing he was discontinuing treatment for brain cancer.
The longtime senator and former Vietnam prisoner of war would have turned 82 on Wednesday.
His wife, Cindy, and family were at his side.
“I was with my father at the end, as he was with me at my beginning,” daughter Meghan McCain tweeted.
John McCain followed his four-star admiral father and grandfather into the Navy, and was likely American’s most famous prisoner of war.
In October 1967, he was shot down over Hanoi during a bombing mission. He suffered torture in his 5½ years as a POW. In that time, her turned down an out-of-sequence early repatriation offer.
He was released in 1973, and retired from the Navy in 1981.
McCain followed his military service with a political career that cast him as a maverick Republican who was known to reach across the aisle and even loudly stand up against his party when he disagreed.
“In the Senate, he embodied the very American notion that we could disagree without losing our commonality, that we could compromise on policy without abandoning our principles — something that is rapidly becoming in short supply,” Gov. Phil Murphy said in a statement. “Tammy and I send our deepest condolences to Cindy and the entire McCain family. Our nation has lost a hero and a guiding light.”
McCain wrote several books. His last was "The Restless Wave," looking back on his life after finding out he had brain cancer.
"I don't know how much longer I'll be here," he writes. "I have some things I'd like to take care of first, some work that needs to be finished, and some people I need to see, And I want to talk to my fellow Americans a little more if I may."
In addition to his wife of 38 years, McCain leaves behind seven children and his 106-year-old mother, Roberta McCain.
“All that I am is thanks to him,” Meghan McCain wrote of her father. “Now that he is gone, the task of my lifetime is to live up to his example, his expectations, and his love.”
During an interview on The View last year with his daughter by his side, McCain was asked how he would like to be remembered.
"He served his country," McCain said.
He then added, "and he's proud of his family and his daughter."
