
He was viewed as the most liberal candidate in the race. Raskin won the seven-way Democratic primary-the real contest in this heavily Democratic district-with 33% of the vote. ĭuring the primary, Raskin was endorsed by the Progressive Action PAC, the political arm of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which grew from 72 members at the time of the endorsement to 92 members in early 2020. On April 19, 2015, The Baltimore Sun and The Washington Post reported that Raskin announced his campaign for Congress and said, "My ambition is not to be in the political center, it is to be in the moral center." The district's seven-term incumbent, Chris Van Hollen, gave up the seat to run for the United States Senate. Raskin campaigning in 2016 with Senator Elizabeth Warren You did not place your hand on the Constitution and swear to uphold the Bible." U.S. On March 1, 2006, during a Maryland State Senate hearing on same-sex marriage, Raskin was noted for his response to an opposing lawmaker: "Senator, when you took your oath of office, you placed your hand on the Bible and swore to uphold the Constitution. Raskin helped lead the fight to legalize same-sex marriage in Maryland. He introduced a medical marijuana bill in 2014 that was signed by Governor Martin O'Malley and went into effect in January 2015. Raskin long championed efforts to reform marijuana laws and legalize medical marijuana in Maryland. A former board member of FairVote, he introduced and sponsored the first bill in the country for the National Popular Vote, a plan for an interstate compact to provide for presidential election by popular vote. Raskin sponsored bills advocating the repeal of the death penalty in Maryland, the expansion of the state ignition interlock device program, and the establishment of the legal guidelines for benefit corporations, a type of for-profit corporation that includes a material societal benefit in its bylaws and decision-making processes. In 2012, he was named Senate majority whip and chaired the Montgomery County Senate Delegation and the Select Committee on Ethics Reform, and was a member of the Judicial Proceedings Committee. In 2006, Raskin was elected as a Maryland state senator for District 20, representing parts of Silver Spring and Takoma Park in Montgomery County. Raskin wrote a Washington Post op-ed that strongly condemned the Federal Election Commission and the Commission on Presidential Debates for their decisions. In 1996, he represented Ross Perot regarding Perot's exclusion from the 1996 United States presidential debates. From 1989 to 1990, Raskin served as general counsel for Jesse Jackson's National Rainbow Coalition.

program on law and government and co-founded the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project. įor more than 25 years, Raskin was a constitutional law professor at American University Washington College of Law, where he taught future fellow impeachment manager Stacey Plaskett. degree magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He graduated from Georgetown Day School in 1979 at age 16, and magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard College in 1983 with a Bachelor of Arts in government with concentration in political theory. Raskin's ancestors immigrated to the U.S. Kennedy on the National Security Council, co-founder of the Institute for Policy Studies, and a progressive activist. His mother was a journalist and novelist, and his father was a former staff aide to President John F. Jamin Ben Raskin was born to a Jewish family in Washington, D.C., on December 13, 1962, to Barbara (née Bellman) Raskin and Marcus Raskin. Before his election to Congress, he was a constitutional law professor at American University Washington College of Law, where he co-founded and directed the LL.M. He was also the lead impeachment manager for the second impeachment of President Donald Trump in response to the attack on the U.S. Raskin chairs the Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and co-chairs the Congressional Freethought Caucus. Following redistricting in 2022, Raskin's district now only encompasses a portion of Montgomery County.

The district previously included portions of Montgomery County, a suburban county northwest of Washington, D.C., and extends through rural Frederick County to the Pennsylvania border. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the Maryland State Senate from 2007 to 2016. representative for Maryland's 8th congressional district since 2017. Jamin Ben Raskin (born December 13, 1962) is an American attorney, law professor, and politician serving as the U.S.
