US billionaire Ross Perot, independent presidential candidate who shook up 1992 race, dies age 89
- Perot leapt into the 1992 campaign as an independent and quickly found many Americans turned off by the Republican and Democratic parties
- His outsider bid did not succeed, but he was a successful businessman. His fortune was estimated at US$4.1 billion by Forbes magazine in April
H Ross Perot, the feisty Texas technology billionaire who rattled US politics with two independent presidential campaigns in the 1990s that struck a chord with disgruntled voters, died on Tuesday at the age of 89, his family said.
“Ross Perot, the groundbreaking businessman and loving husband, brother, father and grandfather, passed away early Tuesday at his home in Dallas, surrounded by his devoted family,” the Perot family said in a statement.
Perot’s fortune was estimated at US$4.1 billion by Forbes magazine in April 2019.
He was a natural salesman who made a fortune in computer services but he was an unlikely and unconventional politician. He was short with a buzz-top haircut, spoke with a folksy Texas drawl and had protruding ears that even he joked about. He was blunt and assertive and his success in business made him accustomed to getting his way.
Perot was so gung-ho that when two of his employees were jailed in Iran in 1978, he organised a team of commandos from his employees and hired a former special forces colonel to break them out.