CNN’s Wolf Blitzer Pays Tribute to Jimmy Carter: ‘May His Memory Be A Blessing’

CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer paid tribute to former President Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday at the age of 100.

Minutes after Carter’s death was announced on the network, CNN released a tribute video narrated by Blitzer where he detailed the life and achievements of the 39th president. Blitzer noted that Carter was known for his charity and diplomatic work after leaving the Oval Office.

Blitzer then joined CNN anchor Rahel Solomon where he gave a live reaction to Carter’s passing. The longtime network anchor said that he believes Carter will be remembered for his diplomatic success, including the Camp David Accords that led to peace between Israel and Egypt.

BLITZER: I think they’ll be most closely associated with all those issues. You mentioned the issues that I mentioned, including the Camp David Accords, the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. His efforts in the Middle East, sometimes controversial but always well-intentioned. And he deserves a lot of credit for what he tried to do to bring peace to the region. He brought peace to Israel and Egypt, but there was still so much else to do. But, you know, he obviously had a lot of problems during his first term. Economic issues in the United States. You know, inflation was not good. And then the American diplomats at the U.S. embassy in Tehran were taken hostage, kidnaped by the Iranian regime. And it was a huge issue in his bid for reelection. And he was defeated in that election in part because those hostages were still being held in Iran. All those American diplomats at the U.S. embassy when the Iranian military went into the U.S. embassy, they shut it down and took all those Americans who were inside and made them hostage. Eventually, after he was defeated, Ronald Reagan became president. They were allowed to come back to the United States. But that was an issue that caused so much controversy every day, day one, day two, Nightline on ABC, every night, they devoted their show to Americans held hostage in Iran. And it was just a devastating issue, a horrible issue at the time. And certainly one of the major factors that led to his defeat.

SOLOMON: Yeah. And then, Wolf, I mean, just sort of circling back to the last year or so, I mean, just sort of reminds us. I mean, we know that he had been we got the announcement, I believe it was from the Carter Center that he had been receiving hospice care at home since February. He recently turned 100. But we had been sort of still getting these drips and drabs from Jimmy Carter’s family or those around him about how he was doing. We knew that he wanted to make it through the election. We had gotten that reporting, but we had still been sort of hearing from those around him. And in the last year or so, even though he was in hospice care.

BLITZER: Yeah. And I was always checking in to see how he was doing with his friends and his family. And I would get updates. And I was always pretty much encouraged. Even though he was in the hospice for the past year, he was still enjoying and watching sports and I was enjoying watching sports. But he was a big Atlanta Braves fan. Baseball fan was watching games with his kids and his grandkids and his family and friends. So I would always get relatively upbeat assessments on how he was doing over the past year. But everybody knew under hospice it was only a matter of time and a hundred years old, you know, that’s a very, very long life that he’s that he led. So we all anticipated it was only a matter of time. And now it has happened. And I just I think I speak for so many of our viewers in the United States and around the world when I say I want to express our deepest, deepest condolences to his loving family. May he rest in peace. And as we say, may his memory be a blessing.

Watch the clip above via CNN.