| John A. Pérez | |
|---|---|
| Pérez in 2010. | |
| 68th Speaker of the California State Assembly | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office March 1, 2010 |
|
| Governor | Arnold Schwarzenegger Jerry Brown |
| Preceded by | Karen Bass |
| Member of the California State Assembly from the 46th district |
|
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office December 1, 2008 |
|
| Preceded by | Fabian Núñez |
| Personal details | |
| Born | September 28, 1969 |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Residence | Los Angeles, California |
| Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley |
| Website | asmdc.org/Speaker |
John A. Pérez (born September 28, 1969) is a union organizer and politician from Los Angeles, California, who has been the Speaker of the California State Assembly since March 1, 2010. A Democrat, he represents the 46th district in the California State Assembly.
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Pérez grew up in El Sereno and Highland Park before attending the University of California, Berkeley. He did not graduate from Berkeley but instead dropped out after his junior year due to family medical reasons, choosing not to return for a fourth year in the fall of 1990. Various biographies of Pérez dating back to the 1990s had falsely stated that he was a Berkeley graduate, an assertion included in several press releases issued by mayors of Los Angeles and in 2004 remarks inserted by then-Congresswoman Hilda Solis into the Congressional Record. When the San Francisco Chronicle wrote about these inconsistencies in May 2011, Pérez's office clarified that he was not, in fact, a Berkeley graduate.[1]
Pérez is the cousin of Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and has spent seven years handling political matters for the United Food and Commercial Workers, a union representing supermarket workers,[2] and also has served as political director of the California Labor Federation.[3] He was a member of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency until 2008, when he resigned from the board in order to run for the Assembly.
Long active in the labor movement, Pérez is a member of the Democratic National Committee, which made him a superdelegate to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver.[4][5] He endorsed Barack Obama on June 3, 2008, the day of the final contests in the Democratic presidential nominating calendar.[6]
The 46th district includes the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Boyle Heights, Little Tokyo, Westlake, Vernon and part of South Los Angeles. Pérez succeeded Fabian Núñez, the former Assembly speaker who was forced out by term limits, as the district's assemblyman. Pérez faced only a little-known primary challenger in the race to succeed him,[7] winning convincingly.[8] In the general election held on November 4, 2008, he won 85% of the vote.
Rather than seek the speakership of the Assembly, Pérez had been intending to run for the California Senate in 2010 with Kevin de León slated to be elected speaker. An agreement had apparently been reached by Los Angeles power brokers that would have seen Pérez support de León for speaker while Pérez would run unopposed in the 22nd senate district, the seat being vacated by term-limited Gil Cedillo. Cedillo, in turn, would seek Pérez's seat in the Assembly.[2]
The deal appears to have been derailed by opposition amongst Assembly Democrats to de León becoming speaker and by a desire to elect a speaker who could serve longer than two years - de León, unlike Pérez, will be forced out by term limits in 2012.[2] The leadership battle came to a head on December 3, 2009, when Assembly Speaker Karen Bass announced that Pérez had enough support to succeed her.[9] On December 10, the Assembly Democratic caucus met to select the next speaker. During the meeting, de León threw his support to Pérez, who was elected unopposed.[10] He was formally elected by a 48–26 vote of the full Assembly on January 7, 2010 and replaced Bass on March 1, 2010.[11]
Pérez is openly gay[12] – he is the first openly LGBT Speaker of the California State Assembly[10] and, after Minnesota's Allan Spear, only the second LGBT person to be elected to lead a state legislative chamber. Gordon D. Fox, an openly gay Democrat, was elected speaker of the Rhode Island House of Representatives in February 2010 (after Pérez had been elected Speaker) but took office immediately (i.e. before Pérez).
Pérez's 2008 election won the endorsement of the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund.[13]
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