Congressmember Yvette Diane Clarke, 60, has been a powerhouse New York politician for the final 22 years. She feels honored to symbolize the neighborhood that raised her.
Born in Flatbush, Brooklyn, Clarke is the daughter of Jamaican immigrants. She is particularly proud to have actually adopted within the footsteps of her mom, Dr. Una S. T. Clarke, in pursuing a lifetime of politics and neighborhood service.
“She is the very best mother ever, and rising up along with her was simply a lifetime of love and laughter, self-discipline, and focus,” mentioned Clarke. “I actually developed my love of service as a result of I used to be by her aspect as a toddler. My mother and father didn’t have entry to daycare companies and so my mother would mainly take me to the entire organizing conferences that she attended. I used to be that child within the nook with their lunchbox, their knapsack, and coloring ebook, simply listening to how mother and father and neighborhood leaders had been organizing.”
She attended Oberlin Faculty and was a recipient of the Affiliation for Public Coverage Evaluation & Administration (APPAM) Sloan Fellowship. She obtained the honorary diploma of physician of legal guidelines honoris causa from the College of Expertise, Jamaica, and the honorary doctorate of public coverage from the College of the Commonwealth Caribbean. She can be a proud member of the Brooklyn Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.
Earlier than her time as a politician, Clarke served as director of enterprise improvement for the Bronx Empowerment Zone (BOEDC). She was elected to function a Metropolis Council
member for the fortieth District in Brooklyn from 2000 to 2007 — succeeding her mom, who served in the identical seat from 1992 to 2001.
Clarke went on to be elected as a member of the U.S. Home of Representatives, first in 2006 for New York’s eleventh Congressional District from 2007 to 2013. As a result of redistricting, she was moved to New York’s ninth Congressional District within the 2012 election.
As a daughter of immigrants, Clarke introduced the eagerness of her Caribbean heritage to Congress. She co-chairs the Congressional Caribbean Caucus and the Congressional Haiti Caucus, working to foster relationships between the U.S. and the Caribbean Group. Each of her mother and father are naturalized U.S. residents, and are keenly conscious of the rise of anti-immigrant sentiments domestically and nationally.
“Most immigrants come throughout the most efficient years of their lives and all they wish to do is add worth,” mentioned Clarke, “so to listen to anti-immigrant sentiments which are clearly focused towards communities of shade extra particularly — as a result of they’re immigrants from East and Western Europe that we don’t see the identical vitriol focused at — [is] a painful reminder of the systemic racism that is part of this nation.”
Clarke can be co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on Black Girls and Ladies, and the Congressional Caucus on Digital Augmented and Combined Actuality Applied sciences. She has been a member of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), serving as its first vice chair and chair of its Immigration Activity Drive. Just lately, Clarke was elected to move the CBC as chairperson.
