63 Facts About Gillibrand

Kirsten Elizabeth Gillibrand is an American lawyer and politician serving as the junior United States senator from New York since 2009.

Gillibrand represented New York's 20th congressional district and was reelected in 2008.

Gillibrand won a special election in 2010 to keep the seat, and was reelected to full terms in 2012 and 2018.

Gillibrand supports paid family leave, a federal jobs guarantee, and the abolition and replacement of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Gillibrand ran for the Democratic nomination for president of the United States in 2020, officially announcing her candidacy on March 17,2019.

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Gillibrand majored in Asian Studies, studying in both Beijing and Taiwan.

Gillibrand received her JD from UCLA School of Law and passed the bar exam in 1991.

Gillibrand worked closely on the case and became a key part of the defense team.

Gillibrand left Boies in 2005 to begin her 2006 campaign for Congress.

Gillibrand has said her work at private law firms allowed her to take on pro bono cases defending abused women and their children and tenants seeking safe housing after lead paint and unsafe conditions were found in their homes.

Gillibrand worked on HUD's Labor Initiative and its New Markets Initiative, on TAP's Young Leaders of the American Democracy, and on strengthening Davis–Bacon Act enforcement.

In 1999, Gillibrand began working on Hillary Clinton's 2000 US Senate campaign, focusing on campaigning to young women and encouraging them to join the effort.

Gillibrand donated more than $12,000 to Clinton's Senate campaigns.

Gillibrand considered running for office in 2004, in New York's 20th congressional district, against the three-term Republican incumbent John E Sweeney.

Gillibrand's legal representation of Philip Morris was an issue during the campaign.

Len Cutler, director of the Center for the Study of Government and Politics at Siena College, said that the seat would be difficult for Gillibrand to hold in 2008, with Republicans substantially outnumbering Democrats in the district.

Treadwell lost despite significantly outspending Gillibrand and promising never to vote to raise taxes, not to accept a federal salary, and to limit himself to three terms in office.

Gillibrand said that she never hid her work for Philip Morris, and added that as an associate at her law firm, she had had no control over which clients she worked for.

Gillibrand opposed a 2007 state-level proposal to issue driver's licenses to illegal immigrants and voted for legislation that would withhold federal funds from immigrant sanctuary cities.

Gillibrand expressed personal support for same-sex marriage, but advocated for civil unions for same-sex couples and said same-sex marriage should a state-level issue.

Gillibrand published earmark requests she received and her personal financial statement.

Gillibrand quietly campaigned for the position, meeting secretly with Paterson on at least one occasion.

Gillibrand said that she made an effort to underscore her successful House elections in a largely conservative district, adding that she could be a good complement to Chuck Schumer.

Gillibrand was presumed a likely choice in the days before the official announcement.

Gillibrand was relatively unknown statewide, and many voters found the choice surprising.

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Shortly before her appointment to the Senate was announced, Gillibrand reportedly contacted the Empire State Pride Agenda, an LGBT lobbying organization in New York, to express her full support for same-sex marriage, the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, the repeal of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy regarding gay and lesbian servicemembers, and the passage of legislation banning discrimination against transgender persons.

Gillibrand had supported civil unions for same-sex couples and argued that the same-sex marriage issue should be left to states.

Gillibrand was sworn in on January 26,2009; at 42, she entered the chamber as the youngest senator in the 111th Congress.

Gillibrand had numerous potential challengers in the September 14,2010, Democratic primary election.

Gillibrand was endorsed by The New York Times and the Democrat and Chronicle.

Gillibrand carried all counties except for two in western New York.

Gillibrand was endorsed by the progressive groups Indivisible and Working Families.

For example, although she had been quiet on the US military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy when she was in the House, during her first 18 months in the Senate, Gillibrand was an important part of the successful campaign to repeal it.

Gillibrand made national headlines in February 2009 for stating that she and her husband kept two guns under their bed.

In March 2011, Gillibrand co-sponsored the PROTECT IP Act, which would restrict access to websites judged to be infringing copyrights, but ultimately announced she would not support the bill as-is due to wide critical public response.

In 2012, Gillibrand authored a portion of the STOCK Act, which extended limitations on insider trading by members of Congress.

Gillibrand's bill failed to gain enough votes to break a filibuster in March 2014, but her efforts likely improved her standing as a lawmaker in the Senate.

In December 2013, Gillibrand introduced the Family and Medical Insurance Leave Act, which would have provided paid family leave.

In 2014, Gillibrand was included in the annual Time 100, Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world.

In 2015, Gillibrand invited campus activist Emma Sulkowicz to attend the State of the Union Address.

Gillibrand's invitation was intended to promote the Campus Accountability and Safety Act, a bill Gillibrand co-sponsored.

Gillibrand once supported legislation that would criminalize "boycotts" by individuals or groups seeking to express a disapproval of the actions taken by the government of Israel.

In July 2017, Gillibrand stated that she no longer supported the bill in its then-current form, adding that she would advocate for changes to it.

Gillibrand was named as part of the "Hell-No Caucus" by Politico in 2018, along with Senators Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders, for voting "overwhelmingly to thwart [Trump's] nominees for administration jobs", such as with Rex Tillerson, Betsy DeVos, and Mike Pompeo; all the senators were considered potential 2020 presidential contenders at the time, and all five did run for president in 2020.

In early 2019, on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Gillibrand announced the formation of an exploratory committee to consider running for the Democratic nomination in the 2020 United States presidential election.

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Gillibrand had frequently been mentioned as a possible 2020 contender by the media before her announcement, but during a 2018 Senate campaign debate, she had promised to serve her entire six-year term if she were reelected.

Gillibrand suspended her campaign on August 28,2019, citing her failure to qualify for the third round of Democratic primary debates.

Gillibrand neither met the polling threshold nor sustained the fundraising quota set as debate qualifications.

Gillibrand voted for a bill that limited information-sharing between federal agencies about firearm purchasers and advocated for civil unions for same-sex couples.

In July 2018, Newsday wrote that Gillibrand "formerly held more conservative views on guns and immigration, but, in her nine years as New York's junior senator, [has] swung steadily to the left on those and other issues".

In June 2018, Gillibrand called US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, a "deportation force" and became the first sitting senator to support the call to abolish ICE.

Gillibrand said, "I believe you should get rid of it, start over, reimagine it and build something that actually works" and "I think you should reimagine ICE under a new agency with a very different mission".

In July 2018, The New York Times wrote that Gillibrand had "spent recent months injecting her portfolio with a dose of the kind of economic populism that infused Senator Bernie Sanders's campaign in the 2016 presidential primary".

In July 2017, Gillibrand said she no longer supported the bill in its then-current form, adding that she would advocate for changes to it.

In 2018, Gillibrand said she was "embarrassed and ashamed" of the positions on guns and immigration she took during her House tenure.

Gillibrand has gone against her party on a number of occasions on issues related to women's rights.

In 2019, seven Democratic current and former US senators who had demanded Franken's resignation in 2017 told New Yorker reporter Jane Mayer they had been wrong to do so, but Gillibrand has expressed no regrets for leading the demand for his resignation.

In November 2017, amid the MeToo movement, Gillibrand became the first high-profile Democrat to say that Bill Clinton should have resigned when his affair with Monica Lewinsky was revealed.

Gillibrand met her husband, Jonathan Gillibrand, a venture capitalist and British national, on a blind date.

Gillibrand continued to work until the day of Henry's delivery and received a standing ovation from her colleagues in the House for doing so.

Gillibrand stated in 2020 that her family was looking for a house in the North Country.

Gillibrand was inducted into Omicron Delta Kappa, a national leadership honor society, as an honoris causa initiate at SUNY Plattsburgh in 2012.

In 2014, Gillibrand published her first book, Off the Sidelines: Raise Your Voice, Change the World.