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Former State Sen. Tom Hayden said he is “recovering steadily” from a stroke.
Hayden, who came to fame as a leading anti-Vietnam war activist and was once married to film star Jane Fonda, told City News Service in a telephone interview from his room at UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica that “I’m under the care of a very, very good medical team of UCLA doctors and graduate students.”
The 75-year-old Hayden said Monday he suffered the stroke on May 21 when he was in Kern County “with a group of people concerned about the effects of fracking and oil drilling.”
Hayden said he is undergoing various forms of rehabilitation “to improve my brain, my muscles and body.”
“There is no dateline on my release,” said Hayden, who during the interview did not exhibit any speech problems.
Hayden was a founder of the Students for a Democratic Society in 1961, wrote the group’s Port Huron Statement, was a leader in demonstrations at the 1968 Democratic National Convention against U.S involvement in the Vietnam War and a defendant in the Chicago 8 case.
Hayden served in the Assembly from 1982-92 and the state Senate from 1992-2000. He also made unsuccessful runs for the Democratic nomination for senator in 1976 and governor in 1994 and lost races for mayor of Los Angeles in 1997 and a City Council seat in 2001.
—City News Service