Cedric Richmond

Cedric Levan Richmond (born September 13, 1973) is an American attorney, politician, and political advisor who is a senior adviser to the Democratic National Committee. A member of the Democratic Party, Richmond represented the 101st district in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 2000 to 2011. Richmond was a member of the United States House of Representatives from Louisiana's 2nd congressional district from 2011 to 2021. His district included most of New Orleans. He was formerly a senior advisor to the president and was the first director of the White House Office of Public Engagement during the presidency of Joe Biden.

From 2017 to 2019, Richmond chaired the Congressional Black Caucus. Beginning with his third term, he was the only Louisiana Democrat serving in either chamber of the United States Congress. In 2019, he was named the first national co-chair of Joe Biden's 2020 presidential campaign. On September 5, 2020, he was named a co-chair of Biden's presidential transition. On November 17, 2020, Richmond announced he would leave Congress in January 2021 to serve as Senior Advisor to the President and director of the White House Office of Public Liaison, which Biden renamed the White House Office of Public Engagement.

Richmond was born in New Orleans in 1973 and raised in New Orleans East, where he attended public schools. His father died when he was seven years old. His mother was a public school teacher and small business owner. Richmond graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Morehouse College, and a Juris Doctor from Tulane School of Law. He also completed an executive program at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. While at Morehouse, Richmond played college baseball as a pitcher for the Morehouse Maroon Tigers in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. He married Raquel Greenup in 2015.

Richmond was elected and served as a member of the Louisiana House of Representatives from the 101st district (Orleans Parish) from 2000 to 2011. He was elected shortly after his 27th birthday and was one of the youngest legislators ever to serve in Louisiana when he took office. He served as the chairman of the House Committee on Judiciary and as a member of the House Ways and Means Committee, House Executive Committee, and the Legislative Audit Advisory Council.

Richmond was elected to the US House of Representatives from Louisiana's 2nd congressional district for the first time in 2010. He took office in 2011. He was reelected in 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018, and 2020. In 2012, Richmond publicly opposed a plan for Louisiana to redirect federal hurricane-recovery funds toward Superdome renovations, specifically raising concerns about the priorities of the Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District's facility funding.

On June 9, 2014, Richmond introduced the Honor Flight Act, a bill that would direct the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to establish a process for providing expedited and dignified passenger screening services for veterans traveling on an Honor Flight to visit war memorials that had been built to honor their service.

That year Richmond defended his Republican colleague Vance McAllister, who had become embroiled in an alleged adultery scandal. Richmond said that he associated the controversy around McAllister with "gotcha moments" in which the "two parties in this country have gone overboard...and taken joy in the pain of their supposed opponents".

Richmond was one of a few Democrats who voted to authorize the Keystone XL pipeline. In 2020, he was described as the fifth-biggest recipient of money from fossil fuel donors among House Democrats. The League of Conservation Voters gave him one of the lowest ratings of all Democratic members of Congress.