John McCain, war hero, political maverick and GOP standard-bearer, dies at 81

John McCain, war hero, political maverick and GOP standard-bearer, dies at 81

Arizona Sen. John McCain, who survived 5½ years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam to become one of the highest-profile, most confounding and pugnacious personalities in American politics — a one-time Republican presidential standard-bearer who alternately trampled and embraced GOP orthodoxy — has died. He was 81.

McCain, who was diagnosed with brain cancer in July 2017, died at 4:28 p.m. Saturday, his office confirmed in a statement. McCain's passing came a day after his family announced he was ceasing medical treatment.

Although he spent more than three decades in Congress representing his adopted home state, McCain was hardly a stamped-from-the-mold politician. At a time when the country grew increasingly tribal and partisan, he drew admiration and antagonism from both parties.

“Warts and all, he was an iconic figure,” said Charlie Cook, a nonpartisan campaign analyst who followed McCain’s political career from the lawmaker’s arrival in Washington in the early 1980s. “As irascible and curmudgeonly as he could be, he was real. There was an authenticity.”