David A. Cromartie
From Usgovsim
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| Congressman | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| In Office: January 2009 - November 2013 | ||||
| Constituency | California's 9th | |||
| Preceded by | Barbara Lee | |||
| Succeeded by | Tyrone Williamson | |||
| Born | June 30, 1965 Spokeane, Washington | |||
| Political Party | Democratic Party | |||
| Spouse | Melissa Gale-Cromartie | |||
| Religion | Agnostic | |||
Born in Spokeane, Washington to what he describes as "moderate Republican parents", David Cromartie was never interested in politics much. That is, until he got to the completely different world of the University of California, Berkeley. His four years (well, four and a half) there transformed him from a mild-mannered know-nothing into an activist for all progressive causes he could find.
Highlights of his activist career include getting arrested (for what the uniformed roughnecks called "disturbing the peace" and "vandalism") in a protest against the 1991 Oil War, breaking three ribs when falling out of a tree he was camped out in to protect it from loggers in the Sierra Mountains, and unsuccessfully trying to organize an "Oral Sex Festival" to display that it really wasn't sex, and thus President Clinton should not be punished for it.
In 1998, Cromartie was elected to the state senate from Alameda County. After serving ten years in the state house, he was inspired to bring the progressive message to Congress and in 2008 ran in the Democratic Primary for the Ninth District seat. A tough three-way race faced him, but he came out victorious with 47% of the vote to Melinda DeJesus's 31% and Tyrone Williamson's 22%. The race was close up until ten days before election day, when Cromartie's campaign unearthed a statement by DeJesus from 2002 in which she seemed to believe that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. Cromartie blasted DeJesus, proclaiming "we don't need a parrot to repeat the warmongering lies of the Bush Administration, we need a hawk to rip them to shreds!" So, after winning the primary, Cromartie easily defeated the Republican Candidate Orville Miller (who seemed to not grasp that Berkeley isn't really interested in ending affirmative action programs) 77% to 19% (four percent voted for DeJesus on the "Partido de Americano Progressiva" ticket).
Cromartie is not without his fair share of controversy, however, though he personally sees most of it as positive. In 2003 on the state senate floor he loudly declared that his stance on stem cell funding "doesn't have a thing in the world to do with healing the sick. It is more important that we show the Religious Right lunatics their place, namely, quiet and in a corner with their rosaries". Republicans called on him to apologize for this, to which he responded "I never apologize for speaking truth to power." Another mild controversy erupted when a person, supposedly him, posted a profanity-filled rant on DemocraticUnderground (under the username "PabloTehPeacemaker") about "the lapdogs of the Neocon agenda" in the Democratic Party, including "that cretin Kerry", "fourteen year old John Edwards", and "war criminal Wesley Clark". Cromartie denied having ever visited the site, though the IP that made the post came from his office in Sacramento.
David Cromartie is very proud of his family. He was married to Melissa Gale on January 14, 1995 and since they have had three children: Marcus (1996), Mumia (1999), and Gerrilyn (2004). He also raises his nephew, Elias Marrero (1995), after his sister and brother-in-law died in a car wreck. David and Melissa were seperated from 2005 to early 2007 as a result of a (allegedly joking) poem he wrote about how he would run away with Cindy Sheehan to a tropical island somewhere. Happily, the two reconciled their differences and are back together.
Tragedy struck the Cromartie family in November 2013, when 14 year old son Mumia was put into a coma after a car wreck in Washington DC. Authorities reported Mumia and the driver had alcohol and ecstasy in their bloodstreams at the time of the accident. After six days in a coma, the decision was made to take the young man off of life support. Cromartie immediately resigned as House Majority Leader (where he had served for ten months) and as Congressman to return home as a family. Tyrone Williamson won the special election to replace him in the Ninth District seat.
