Virginia Senator Mark Warner remembers his call to close friend US Senator John Warner to help balance a budget

“Consensus builder, an authority on military affairs, one of the last World War II veterans to serve in this chamber.”

Those were the words used by Senate Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer to open Wednesday’s session on Capitol Hill, memorializing Virginia Senator John Warner who died late Tuesday from heart failure at the age of 94.

Virginia Senator Mark Warner also rose to pay tribute to his former opponent in a 1996 campaign that he said left him bruised but better because the stoic Naval officer and Marine eventually became a close friend.

Warner even called on his Republican rival to mend fences while governor when a 2 to 1 majority of GOP members could not agree on a state budget.

“And I can still remember sneaking him into the state capitol so the press corps wouldn’t see him and he got up and, you know, up on the third floor where the press room was and in a Zeus-like moment said, ‘Politics be dammed, we’re going to do what’s right for Virginia.'”

(IMAGE: Associated Press / File Photo / Susan Walsh)