Wadie P. Deddeh
Wadie P. Deddeh was an American politician in the state of California. He served in the California State Assembly from 1967 to 1983, and in the California State Senate from 1983 to 1993. He is the first Iraqi-American elected official in the United States. Deddeh wrote the 1972 legislation that created the modern California Department of Transportation, handling the highway functions previously managed by a division of the California Department of Public Works. He died at the age of 98 on August 27, 2019.
