Pat Oliphant, fearless Pulitzer-winning political cartoonist, dies at 90

PHOENIX (AP) — Pat Oliphant, an influential political cartoonist known for creating caricatures of U.S. and world leaders, died Monday. He was 90.

Oliphant died at his home in Santa Fe, New Mexico, from age-related issues, said his son, Grant Oliphant.

A multidimensional artist who also created sculptures, lithographs and oil paintings, Oliphant was widely considered the most syndicated editorial cartoonist in the U.S. During the 1980s, his daily political cartoons appeared in more than 500 publications in the country and around the world.

For over five decades, Oliphant’s work ridiculed powerful figures — from President Lyndon B. Johnson to Donald Trump — with a blunt and meticulous stroke. He drew Jimmy Carter with large teeth and lips, alluding to his background as a farmer and the cultural stereotype of adaptation to rural work, and depicted Ronald Reagan, whom he thought was uninterested in the suffering of the American people, with a cork in his ear.

Those who knew Oliphant said his gift was to merge the shrewdness of an observer of the political scene with a witty sense of humor into art.

“He redefined what it meant to be a political cartoonist and to be fearless in his work,” said Bill Banowsky, director of the documentary A Savage Art: The Life & Cartoons of Pat Oliphant. “His work has a fierce pursuit of bringing injustice to light. And he was very effective.”

Oliphant tackled controversial subjects that were largely...