Rep. Barbara Lee departs Congress after a long and impactful career, leaving behind a legacy of courage, tenacity, and trailblazing achievements.
Rep. Barbara Lee , D-Calif., stands beside a portrait of her friend and mentor, Shirley Chisolm, the first Black woman elected to Congress , at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024. In high school, she was the first Black student to integrate her Southern California cheerleading squad. During the Democrat’s more than two decades in Congress , she has been the only Black woman elected to the House from California’s regions north of Los Angeles.
\“If you really believe that this is the right thing for the country, for your district, for the world, then you have to do it, and be damned everything else,” Lee told The Associated Press during a recent breakfast interview at the Capitol. As Lee heads for the exit, wrapping up a storied career representing the Oakland area, the 78-year-old congresswoman once seen as an outlier with deeply unpopular positions — her vote against the war resulted in death threats — has watched her views come to be respected, accepted and even emulated. Casting her final vote on the House floor in late December, Lee was met with applause, her legacy a touchstone for a new generation. Yet her experiences — including losing a Senate primary in March for a seat later won by a then-House colleague, Democrat Adam Schiff, in the same year that voters nationwide rejected Vice President Kamala Harris for President-elect Donald Trump, — also provide a stark reminder of the challenges Black women confront in American electoral politics. “There are few congressional leaders, public servants, that have served with the kind of courage and tenacity as Congresswoman Lee,” said outgoing Sen. Laphonza Butler, the California Democrat who was appointed temporarily to the seat after the death of long-serving Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein
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