MONTPELIER, Vt. — Former Vermont U.S. Sen. James Jeffords, who in 2001 tipped control of the Senate when he quit the Republican Party to become an independent, died Monday. He was 80.

Jeffords died in Washington, said Diane Derby, a former aide to Jeffords. He had been in declining health, she said.

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Sen. Jim Jeffords, who in 2001 tipped control of the Senate when he quit the Republican Party to become an independent, died Monday at the age of 80. 2006 AP file photo

Jeffords announced in 2005 that he would not seek a fourth term, citing his and his wife’s health problems.

“I have had an enormously satisfying career, one that I would not have traded for any other,” Jeffords said when he retired. “In no other job do you have both the freedom and obligation to solve problems and help people on a daily basis.”

In a statement, President Obama said Jeffords devoted his life to public service.

“During his more than 30 years in Washington, Jim never lost the fiercely independent spirit that made Vermonters, and people across America, trust and respect him,” Obama said.

Vermont’s sole congressman, Bernie Sanders, was elected to Jeffords’ Senate seat in 2006.

U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said Monday that Jeffords was a partner and friend who worked for Vermont.

“He was a Vermonter through and through, drawn to political life to make a difference for our state and nation,” Leahy said. “Part of his legacy will also stand as an enduring chapter of the Senate’s history.”

Jeffords served more than 30 years in Washington. He won election to the House in 1974 as a Republican. The post-Watergate year was a strong one for Democrats nationally, but Jeffords was running as Vermont was just beginning its shift from a century of solid Republicanism to its current status as among the most liberal states.

The Rutland native, a graduate of Yale and Harvard Law School, already had won statewide office as attorney general and was from a well-known Vermont Republican family. His father, Olin Jeffords, had been chief justice of the state Supreme Court.

During his time in Washington, Jeffords stood out as a moderate to liberal Republican during a time when the party was moving to the right. He was a strong backer of education, the environment, job training and help for people with disabilities.

He was the only Republican in the House to vote against President Reagan’s tax cuts in 1981. After election to the Senate in 1988, replacing another moderate Republican, Robert Stafford, Jeffords opposed the first President Bush’s appointment of Clarence Thomas to the U.S. Supreme Court.

A decade later, when Republicans had gained control of both the White House and both houses of Congress, Jeffords, upset with President George W. Bush’s opposition to the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act, decided that was the last straw. In May of 2001, he declared he would leave the Republicans and caucus with the Democrats.

Republicans were apoplectic, particularly because Jeffords’ switch cost them control of the closely divided Senate. Republican Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi dubbed Jeffords’ action a “coup of one,” and described it as “the impetuous decision of one man to undermine our democracy.”

“In 2001, he displayed enormous courage by leaving a party that, he often said, had left him because of its dramatic move to the right,” Sanders, a left-leaning independent, said Monday.

Former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., who ascended from minority to majority leader after Jeffords made his switch, said that Jeffords “was under enormous pressure not to make the change.” Daschle said.

President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Senate GOP leaders and senators, and political supporters in Vermont “all brought pressure to bear, and they did it collectively and in a very concerted way,” Daschle said.

At the heart of Jeffords’ decision was a belief that Republicans in general and Bush in particular had become too conservative and that he could not remain in a party that favored tax breaks for the wealthy over full funding of education programs for the disabled.

He complained at the time that the Republicans in control of both the White House and Congress “were set out on an agenda that did not fit into what the average American wanted to see.”

His wife, Liz, died in 2007 after battling cancer.

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