BHM 2018 - #6: The Ten Black Senators
Since not everyone who gets this mailing understands the Senate well, I am beginning with a few details about it. If you are already familiar with what the Senate does, you can skip that part. I then found an article written in 2009 about “There are No Black Senators” and some reasons why. I thought that was worth sharing.
Then, there are the Senators themselves. I did some digging to find out their positions, what they worked on, and the impact they had, or are having. And which ones might run for president. Out of the ten black senators, 7 are still living, and one has become president. Maybe another. We shall see.
About the Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, which along with the United States House of Representatives—the lower chamber—composes the legislature of the United States. The Senate is composed of senators, each of whom represents a single state in its entirety, with each state being equally represented by two senators, regardless of its population. From 1789 until 1913, Senators were appointed by legislatures of the states they represented; following the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment in 1913, they are now popularly elected.
As the upper house, the Senate has several powers of advice and consent which are unique to it; these include the ratification of treaties and the confirmation of Cabinet secretaries, Supreme Court justices, federal judges, other federal executive officials, flag officers, regulatory officials, ambassadors, and other federal uniformed officers. It further has the responsibility of conducting trials of those impeached by the House. Because of the desire to have two Houses that could act as an internal check on each other, the House of Representatives was intended to be a "People's House" directly elected by the people, and with short terms obliging the representatives to remain close to their constituents. The Senate was intended to represent the states to such extent as they retained their sovereignty except for the powers expressly delegated to the national government. The Senate was thus not designed to serve the people of the United States equally.
The disparity between the most and least populous states has grown since the Connecticut Compromise, which granted each state two members of the Senate and at least one member of the House of Representatives, for a total minimum of three presidential Electors, regardless of population. In 1787, Virginia had roughly ten times the population of Rhode Island, whereas today California has roughly 70 times the population of Wyoming, based on the 1790 and 2000 censuses. This means some citizens are effectively two orders of magnitude better represented in the Senate than those in other states.
Before the adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment in 1913, Senators were elected by the individual state legislatures. Problems with repeated vacant seats due to the inability of a legislature to elect senators, intrastate political struggles, and even bribery and intimidation had gradually led to a growing movement to amend the Constitution to allow for the direct election of senators.
The Senate uses committees (and their subcommittees) for a variety of purposes, including the review of bills and the oversight of the executive branch. Formally, the whole Senate appoints committee members. In practice, however, the choice of members is made by the political parties. Generally, each party honors the preferences of individual senators, giving priority based on seniority. Each party is allocated seats on committees in proportion to its overall strength.
Most committee work is performed by 16 standing committees, each of which has jurisdiction over a field such as finance or foreign relations. Each standing committee may consider, amend, and report bills that fall under its jurisdiction. Furthermore, each standing committee considers presidential nominations to offices related to its jurisdiction. (For instance, the Judiciary Committee considers nominees for judgeships, and the Foreign Relations Committee considers nominees for positions in the Department of State.) Committees may block nominees and impede bills from reaching the floor of the Senate. Standing committees also oversee the departments and agencies of the executive branch. In discharging their duties, standing committees have the power to hold hearings and to subpoena witnesses and evidence.
The current standing committees of the Senate are:
1. Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry;
2. Appropriations;
3. Armed Services;
4. Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs;
5. Budget
6. Commerce, Science, and Transportation
7. Energy and Natural Resources;
8. Environment and Public Works;
9. Finance;
10. Foreign Relations;
11. Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.
12. Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
13. Judiciary
14. Rules and Administration
15. Small Business and Entrepreneurship
16. Veterans Affairs
The Senate also has several committees that are not considered standing committees. Such bodies are generally known as select or special committees; examples include the Select Committee on Ethics and the Special Committee on Aging. Legislation is referred to some of these committees, although the bulk of legislative work is performed by the standing committees. Committees may be established on an ad hoc basis for specific purposes; for instance, the Senate Watergate Committee was a special committee created to investigate the Watergate scandal. Such temporary committees cease to exist after fulfilling their tasks.
African American Senators
To date, ten African Americans have served in the United States Senate. Of the ten senators, six were popularly elected (including one that previously had been appointed by his state's governor), two were elected by the state legislature prior to the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1913 (which provides for the direct election of U.S. Senators by the people of each state), and two were appointed by a state Governor.
The first two African-American senators represented the state of Mississippi during the Reconstruction Era, following the American Civil War. In 1870, Hiram Revels of Mississippi became the first African American senator. Five years later, Blanche K. Bruce of Mississippi took the oath of office. It would be nearly another century, 1967, before Edward Brooke of Massachusetts followed in their historic footsteps. Carol Moseley Braun representing Illinois broke new ground in 1993, becoming the first African American female to serve as U.S. senator, and the second black senator to be popularly elected. In 2005, Barack Obama of Illinois became the fifth African American to serve and third to be popularly elected. Upon Obama's resignation to become the nation's first African American president, Roland Burris was appointed to fill the vacancy, becoming the sixth African American senator and the third to occupy the same Illinois Senate seat. Tim Scott of South Carolina was appointed to fill a vacancy in 2013, becoming the first African American since Reconstruction to represent a Southern state in the Senate. He won a special election in 2014 to complete the term and was elected to a full term in 2016. The appointment of Massachusetts senator William "Mo" Cowan to replace John Kerry on February 1, 2013, marked the first time that two African Americans have served simultaneously in the United States Senate. Cowan was not re-elected. Cory Booker of New Jersey became the ninth African American senator when he won a special election to replace Senator Frank Lautenberg on October 31, 2013. Booker won election to a full term in 2014. Kamala Harris became California's first African American senator on January 3, 2017, bringing the number of African Americans serving simultaneously to three and the total number of African American senators to ten.
We are Under-represented for a Reason.
To understand why we have had so few black Senators can be approached by looking at the House of Representatives – the “People’s House”. The percentage chance that the Representative in a given Congressional District is black given the African-American population in that district, can be represented by a logistic regression. The chances of having a black Representative are virtually nil until the African-American share of the population hits 25 percent, at which time it begins to accelerate rapidly until the black population hits 60 percent, after which point having a black congressman is virtually certain.
Of course, the states are effectively big Congressional Districts for purposes of electing senators and governors. In fact, while there are a decent number of Congressional Districts that have African-American populations of 25 percent or more, only six states do, and five of the six are culturally conservative areas in the Deep South.. Suppose you added up the probabilities of each state electing a black congressman, and then multiplied it by two since each state gets to elect two senators. How many black senators would you expect? You’d expect there to be about one — or more precisely, 1.2.
Black candidates for the House of Representatives have not had to develop a message that appeals to white voters, because most of them don’t have very many white voters in their districts (about half the nation’s African-American population is limited to the 60 blackest Congressional Districts). Nor do they have very many conservative voters in their districts, and so they have not had to develop a message that appeals to conservatives, even though the black population itself is far more diverse in its political views than is generally acknowledged.
Because they are not very representative of their states as a whole, moreover, these districts are also not likely to be very good launching pads for ascension to the Senate or to the governor’s mansion.
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Here they are – In Detail.
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Hiram Revels (R-MS) became the first African American senator in 1870. Born in North Carolina in 1827, Revels attended Knox College in Illinois and later served as minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Baltimore, Maryland. He raised two black regiments during the Civil War and fought at the battle of Vicksburg in Mississippi. The Mississippi state legislature sent him to the U.S. Senate during Reconstruction where he became an outspoken opponent of racial segregation. Revels served on the Committees of Education and Labor as well as the Committee on the District of Columbia. Much of the Senate's attention focused on Reconstruction issues. While Radical Republicans called for continued punishment of ex-Confederates, Revels argued for amnesty and a restoration of full citizenship, provided they swore an oath of loyalty to the United States. Revels supported bills to invest in developing infrastructure in Mississippi: to grant lands and right of way to aid the construction of the New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad and levees on the Mississippi river. He argued for integration of schools in the District of Columbia.[4] He also nominated a black youth to West Point, successfully championed the cause of black workers who had been barred by their color from working at the Washington Navy Yard.. Revels served in the Senate for just a year, he broke new ground for African Americans in Congress.
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Born into slavery in 1841, Blanche K. Bruce (R-MS) spent his childhood years in Virginia where he received his earliest education from the tutor hired to teach his master's son. At the dawn of the Civil War, Bruce escaped slavery and traveled north to begin a distinguished career in education and politics. Elected to the Senate in 1874 by the Mississippi state legislature, he served a full term from 1875 to 1881. When the Democrats gained control of the state in the same year he was elected, Bruce became increasingly isolated politically. Through the remainder of his term he supported freedman’s issues against the backdrop of Democratic rule of Mississippi. Bruce argued for levee systems and railroad construction, advocated political reform in federal elections, and spoke out for civil rights for blacks, Native Americans, and Chinese who were becoming a major labor force in the Delta region of the state. After his Senate term ended Bruce was appointed to three posts by Republican Presidents. President James Garfield named him Register of the Treasury, a post he held until 1885, making Bruce the first black man to have his signature on US currency.
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The first African American elected to the Senate by popular vote, Edward Brooke (R-MA) served two full terms, from 1967 to 1979. Born in Washington, D.C., in 1919, Brooke graduated from Howard University before serving in the United States Army during World War II. After the war, he received his juris doctor degree from Boston University .Before becoming a Senator, Brooke was the Massachusetts Attorney General (the first black Attorney General in any state) and held other key posts which enabled him to beat a former state governor for his position in the Senate. Brooke, an African American, Protestant Republican, won elective office in the overwhelmingly white, Catholic, Democratic state of Massachusetts, The black vote had, Time wrote, "no measurable bearing" on the election as less than 3% of the state's population was black, and Peabody also supported civil rights for blacks. In the Senate, Brooke aligned with the liberal faction of Republicans. He co-wrote the 1968 Fair Housing Act which prohibits housing discrimination. During his Senate career he championed the causes of increased minimum wage and promoted commuter rail and mass transit systems. He also worked tirelessly to promote racial equality in the South. In 1969, Brooke broke ranks with President Richard Nixon, a fellow Republican, because he believed the President's Supreme Court nominee Clement Haynsworth was a segregationist. Brooke led a bipartisan coalition that defeated Haynsworth’s nomination. A few months later he again organized sufficient Republican support to defeat Nixon's second Supreme Court nominee, Harold Carswell, who had also voiced support for racial segregation. ‘Brooke opposed repeated Administration attempts to close down the Job Corps and the Office of Economic Opportunity and to weaken the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission—all foundational elements of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society. On November 4, 1973, Brooke became the first Republican to call on President Nixon to resign because of the Watergate Scandal. He had risen to become the ranking Republican on the Senate Banking Committee and on two powerful Appropriations subcommittees, Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS) and Foreign Operations. From these positions, Brooke defended and strengthened the programs he supported; for example, he was a leader in enactment of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which ensured married women the right to establish credit in their own name. When Brooke supported abortion, he lost the support of the Massachusetts Catholic base; additionally, his divorce was ugly – Brooke made false statements about his finances. It is thought that this negative publicity cost him his third term.
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Some called 1992 the "Year of the Woman." More women than ever before were elected to political office in November of that year, and five of them came to the U.S. Senate. Carol Moseley Braun (D-IL) not only joined that class on January 3, 1993, but also became the first African American woman ever to serve as U.S. Senator. Moseley Braun was first elected to public office in 1978, as a member of the Illinois House of Representatives. There, she rose to the post of assistant majority leader. As a State Representative, she became recognized as a champion for liberal social causes. In 1991, angered by incumbent Democratic senator Alan Dixon's vote to confirm Clarence Thomas, Moseley Braun challenged him in the primary election. During her Senate career, Moseley Braun sponsored progressive education bills and campaigned for gun control. She served on several committees, including the powerful Senate Finance Committee – the first woman to ever do so. Despite her reputation as a liberal Democrat, Moseley Braun possessed something of a centrist record on economic issues. She voted for the 1993 budget package and against the welfare reform laws passed in 1996, but on many other matters she was more conservative. Moseley Braun voted in favor of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and lawsuit reform measures like the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (she was also among the minority of Democrats to support the even more controversial Common Sense Product Liability and Legal Reform Act of 1995). She also voted contrary to the interests of the more populist wing of the party by voting for the Freedom to Farm Act and the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Like her Illinois colleague, fellow Democrat Paul Simon, she voted in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the United States Constitution and also to place a nuclear spent fuel storage facility in Nevada, a move strongly opposed by many Democrats, especially former Majority Leader Harry Reid.
On social issues however, she was significantly more liberal than many of her fellow senators. She was strongly pro-choice, voting against the ban on partial-birth abortions and the restrictions on funding in military bases for abortions. She also voted against the death penalty and in favor of gun control measures. Moseley Braun was one of only sixteen senators to vote against the Communications Decency Act and one of only fourteen to vote against the Defense of Marriage Act. She delivered a eulogy to Thurgood Marshall on January 26, 1993.
Moseley Braun left the Senate in January of 1999 and soon after became the U.S. Ambassador to New Zealand, a position she held until 2001. Moseley Braun ran for the Democratic nomination for president in 2004.
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Barack Obama (D-IL) was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. He received his earliest education in Hawaii and Indonesia, and then graduated from Columbia University in 1983. He moved to Chicago in 1985 to work for a church-based group seeking to improve living conditions in poor neighborhoods. In 1991, Obama graduated from Harvard Law School where he was the first African American president of the Harvard Law Review. He served in the Illinois state senate from 1997 to 2004. Obama won his election to the Senate in what could be described as a fluke. The Republican nominee withdrew 3 months before the election and a Marylander, Alan Keyes, established residency in Illinois to run in his place. Obama won by a landslide, becoming the fifth African American to serve in the Senate on January 3, 2005. Obama actually only served 3 years in the Senate. He served on the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, the Committee on Veterans Affairs, the Committee on Environment and Public Works, and the Committee on Foreign Relations. In his first session (109th Congress), he was involved in immigration reform including border security. Legislation bearing his name was passed for armament reduction and federal transparency as well as relief aid. In the first year of the 110th Congress, he worked on lobbying and campaign finance reform, election reform, climate control and troop reduction. In the second year, he legislated for oversight of certain military discharges, Iran divestment and nuclear terrorism reduction. He successfully sponsored a Mercury Export Ban, and a Congo Relief , Security and Democracy Promotion Act. As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Obama made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, specifically Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Kuwait, Iraq, Jordan, Israel, Kenya, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Chad.
Obama was characterized as having one of the worst voting attendance records in the Senate, especially during campaigning. Most of the votes Obama missed were for amendments to spending bills, when his vote would not have decided the outcome. Additionally, 123 times, Obama did not actually vote on an issue, but instead voted “present” instead of yea or nay. He was hounded for these issues during his presidential campaign. The AP reported that Obama said the votes represented a small portion — a little more than 3 percent — of the "roughly 4,000" votes he cast as a member of the state Senate. Obama's allies and supporters have argued that his votes were not an attempt to dodge difficult issues. Instead, according to the Times, they claim Obama "used the present vote to protest bills that he believed had been drafted unconstitutionally or as part of a broader legislative strategy."
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Born in Centralia, Illinois, on August 3, 1937, Roland Burris (D-IL) earned a bachelor of arts degree in political science from Southern Illinois University Carbondale and a juris doctor degree from Howard University. After finishing law school in 1963, Burris became the first African American to work as a national bank examiner for the Treasury Department. When Burris was elected comptroller of Illinois in 1978, he was the first African American to win a statewide election in Illinois. After serving more than ten years as comptroller, he became attorney general of Illinois. Appointed to the Senate on December 31, 2008, Burris filled the vacancy caused by the resignation of Barack Obama, serving for less than one year. Burris’ appointment was surrounded by controversy because the governor was thought to be auctioning the seat. When the Illinois Secretary of State did not sign the Senate’s certification form, the Senate refused to seat him. The Illinois Supreme Court ruled that only the governor’s signature was required, and Burris was finally seated. Burris served on the Committee on Armed Services the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, and the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.
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Appointed to the Senate on January 2, 2013, Tim Scott (R-SC) became the first African American since Reconstruction to represent a Southern state in the Senate. Born in North Charleston, S.C., on September 19, 1965, Scott attended Presbyterian College in Clinton, S.C., before graduating with a bachelor of science degree from Charleston Southern University in Charleston, S.C., in 1988. An entrepreneur, Scott pursued a career in insurance and real estate. He served on the Charleston County, S.C., council from 1995 until 2008, and was a member of the South Carolina house of representatives from 2009 until 2010. Elected as a Republican representative to the One Hundred Twelfth Congress, Scott served one term in the House of Representatives before being appointed to the United States Senate. He was elected in a 2014 special election for the term ending January 3, 2017, and to a full term in 2016. Scott sits on the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, the Committee on Finance, the Committee on Armed Services, the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship and the Special Committee on Aging. Since his arrival in the Senate, Scott has been a reliable conservative, largely voting in line with party orthodoxy. He is ardently opposed to abortion rights, has steadfastly supported efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and has opposed gun control measures. More recently, he’s also proved to be a strong ally of Trump. Scott has voted in line with the president 94% of the time, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight. In July, Scott was one of 22 Republican senators who signed a letter urging Trump to withdraw from the Paris climate accord. Scott has used his relationship with Trump as an opportunity to raise issues around race. Scott met with Trump after the President’s callous remarks about the violence in Charlottesville. In July of 2016, Following last summer's widely publicized police shootings of black men in Louisiana, Minnesota and Dallas, Texas, Scott delivered a series of Senate floor speeches about his experience as a black man in America in the wake of a pair of fatal police shootings of black men – Philando Castile in Minnesota and Alton Sterling in Louisiana – and the killing of five police officers in Dallas. He spoke with raw emotion of “the humiliation” he felt when he was pulled over by the police seven times in one year, with an officer suggesting in one instance that the car Scott was driving might be stolen. Scott also recalled being denied entry into an office building even as a senator, despite wearing the pin on his lapel that distinguishes him as a member of Congress.
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The appointment of Massachusetts senator William "Mo" Cowan (D-MA) on February 1, 2013, marked the first time that two African Americans have served simultaneously in the United States Senate. Born in Yadkinville, North Carolina, in 1969, Cowan earned a bachelor of arts degree in sociology from Duke University and a juris doctor degree from Northeastern University School of Law. After finishing law school in 1994, Cowan practiced civil litigation and became a partner in a law firm. Prior to entering the Senate, he served as chief legal counsel and chief of staff to Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick. Cowan served in the Senate until July 15, 2013, a total of 5 months; a successor having been chosen in a special election. He was not a candidate for election to the unexpired portion of the term. Cowan from the start had no intentions on running in a special election to remain Senator for the rest of John Kerry’s term. Cowan was quoted in the Boston Herald as saying “This is going to be a very short political career.” Cowan served on the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation and the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship. Just two months into his Senate service, two bombs exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three spectators and injuring scores of others. Cowan later noted the outpouring of support from his Senate colleagues: “In April I experienced the very best of this body’s character . . . when Members from every corner of this Nation extended their sympathies, their prayers, and pledged their assistance and support for the city of Boston and to all those affected by that tragedy.” During his tenure in the 113th Congress, Cowan was involved with several pieces of legislation. He co-sponsored the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 (S. 47) which passed the Senate on February 12th and the House on February 28th; the President signed it into law on March 7, 2013. Other than several unsuccessful amendments to the Agriculture Reform, Food, and Jobs Act of 2013 (S. 954), he personally introduced and sponsored two noteworthy bills. The first was a bill to amend the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 “to establish a market-driven inventory system” (S. 746). The amendment would allow farm producers, who elect to participate, the option of filing for recourse loans on specific crops such as corn, oats, barley, grain sorghum, wheat, and soybeans produced from 2014 through 2018. The second was a resolution designating November 28, 2013, as “National Holoprosencephaly Awareness Day” (S.Res. 152). Holoprosencephaly, or HPE, is a birth defect that targets the brain and can result in severe skull and facial defects. Senator Cowan left office before either bill could be debated on the Senate Floor.
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Cory Booker (D-NJ) became the first African American to represent New Jersey in the United States Senate on October 31, 2013. Born in Washington, D.C., he earned a bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Stanford and then attended The Queen’s College, University of Oxford, Oxford, England, as a Rhodes Scholar, where he received a graduate degree in 1994. Booker then attended Yale Law School, earning his juris doctor degree in 1997. He served on the Newark City Council from 1998 to 2002 and then as mayor of Newark from 2006 to 2013. As mayor of Newark, New Jersey, he "drew criticism from liberal allies for embracing charter schools and voucher programs advocated by libertarians." "He also championed “enterprise zones,” a free-market approach to solving urban blight credited to the late Jack Kemp, a hard-core supply-sider and occasional Republican presidential contender who helped raise money for Booker’s first mayoral campaign." Booker was elected to the United States Senate in a special election on October 16, 2013, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Frank Lautenberg, a seat subsequently held by appointed senator Jeffrey Chiesa, and took the oath of office on October 31, 2013, for the term ending January 3, 2015. He was elected to a full term in November 2014.
He has been described as a liberal, a moderate, and a neoliberal. In a July 2013 Salon interview, Booker said that "there's nothing in that realm of progressive politics where you won't find me." However, in a September 2013 interview with The Grio, when asked if he considered himself a progressive, he avoided the term, saying he is a Democrat and an American. George Norcross III described Booker as "a new Democrat—a Democrat that's fiscally conservative yet socially progressive." In May 2012, Booker defended Bain Capital's record and criticized Obama's attack on private equity. During his years in office, he has voted on key legislation concerning U.S. economic, environmental, foreign, and national defense policy. He has been a leading voice in bipartisanship throughout his political career garnering praise and criticism from the left and right. His political ideology closely aligns with the New Democrat movement although he has been described as a "political moderate" and practitioner of "neoliberalism". Considered a social liberal, Booker supports women's rights, affirmative action, and single-payer healthcare.
Besides social media advances, Booker wants to see the rest of the tech sector reach its fullest potential, and to do that, he thinks the U.S. government needs to ease up on regulations. We’re not moving at the speed of innovation due to regulations,” he said, adding that because of this, key industries are leaving the U.S. to work on projects in other countries where the rules aren’t as strict. For example, the Federal Aviation Administration has hindered drone innovation to the point where drone companies are leaving the U.S. to test and build in Europe. “We’re being left behind on everything from next-generation nuclear energy to driverless cars and biologics,” Booker said, “and we cannot get left behind.” He supports long-term deficit reduction efforts to ensure economic prosperity, Cap and Trade taxation to combat climate change, and increased funding for education. He supports ending the War on Drugs. He supports abortion rights and affirmative action. Booker supports a single-payer health care plan. In September 2017, he joined Bernie Sanders and 14 other co-sponsors in submitting a single-payer health care plan to congress called the "Medicare for All" bill. On foreign policy, Booker supports scaling down U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and is against intervention in Syria. After the US strike on Syria in April 2017, Booker criticized military action "without a clear plan" or authorization from Congress. He supports a two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. On Iran, Booker has stated the country poses a direct threat to American and Israeli security and feels all options should be on the table for dealing with the conflict. However, his decision to back the Iran nuclear deal framework damaged his long-term relationship with Jewish voters and supporters.
Booker serves on several Senate Committees: Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, including the Subcommittee on Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety, and Security where he is Ranking Member, the Committee on Environment and Public Works, the Committee on Foreign Relations including the Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health Policy where he is Ranking Member, the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship and most recently, the Committee on the Judiciary.
According to several sources, Booker seems to be emerging as one of the top candidates for the Democratic Party. in the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election as he fits several criteria Dems believe could take down the Trump Administration. In an era where bombast is seen as "electable," Booker's viral lashing toward Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen is being seen as a good thing with Democrats. The party wants a leader that will not back down from Trump throughout a campaign, and in a debate, and Booker possesses many qualities that would leave one to believe he's capable. Booker also campaigned for Doug Jones in Alabama, increasing his national visibility.
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Kamala D. Harris (D-CA) became the first African American to represent California in the United States Senate on January 3, 2017. Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University in Washington, D.C., before returning to California to attend the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. After earning her juris doctor degree, Harris served as the deputy district attorney in Alameda County, California, before becoming the managing attorney in the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and then chief of the Division on Children and Families where she established California’s first Bureau of Children’s Justice. Harris was the first African American and first woman elected district attorney of San Francisco (2004-2011) and attorney general of California (2011-2016).
Kamala Harris has been characterized as "the unsilenced, the uncensored, the unstoppable." She began her tenure flying with outspoken vigor. On January 21, 2017, a day after President Trump was sworn into office, Harris called the message of Trump's inaugural address "dark" when speaking during the Women's March on Washington. On January 28, following Trump signing the Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States executive order, which saw terror-prone countries' denizens barred from entering the US for 90 days, Harris dubbed it a "Muslim ban". In early February, Harris spoke in opposition to Trump's cabinet picks Betsy DeVos, for Secretary of Education, and Jeff Sessions, for United States Attorney General. Later that month, in her first speech on the senate floor, Harris spent 12 minutes critiquing Trump's immigration policies. In early March 2017, Harris called on Attorney General Sessions to resign, after it was reported that Sessions spoke twice with Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak. On March 14, Harris claimed repealing the Affordable Care Act would send the message of health care being a "privilege" rather than a "civil right".
Harris’ Committee assignments include: Committee on the Budget, Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs , Select Committee on Intelligence and, Committee on the Judiciary. As both an Asian and Black woman, she is part of 3 caucuses: Congressional Black Caucus, Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, Congressional Caucus for Women's Issues
Harris has a 100% rating from NARAL, opposes the death penalty in general, but has said that she would review each case individually. During her time as San Francisco District Attorney, Harris created the Environmental Justice Unit in the San Francisco District Attorney's Office[162] and prosecuted several industries and individuals for pollution, most notably U-Haul, Alameda Publishing Corporation, and the Cosco Busan oil spill. She also advocated for strong enforcement of environmental protection laws. Harris has an F rating from the National Rifle Association for her consistent efforts supporting gun control. She has come out strong for DREAMERS – California is home to more Dreamers than any other state. She co-sponsored Sander’s “Medicare for All” bill.
There is also talk that Harris will run for president. We shall see.
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