| Karen Carter Peterson | |
|---|---|
| Member of the Louisiana Senate from the 5th district |
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| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 2010 |
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| Preceded by | Cheryl Gray Evans |
| Louisiana House of Representatives from the 93rd District | |
| In office 1999–2010 |
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| Preceded by | Avery Caesar Alexander |
| Succeeded by | Helena Moreno |
| Personal details | |
| Born | November 1, 1969 New Orleans, Louisiana |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse(s) | Dana Peterson[1] |
| Profession | attorney |
Karen Carter Peterson (born November 1, 1969) is a Democratic member of the Louisiana State Senate, representing the 5th District since 2010. She previously served as the representative from District 93 (1999–2010), in the Louisiana House of Representatives and as Speaker Pro Tempore (2008–2010). Peterson is one of three Democratic National Committee Members in Louisiana, the others being State party chair Claude Leach and Ben Jeffers.
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Peterson was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, the daughter of Ken and Gwen Carter. Her father was one of New Orleans’s first black property tax assessors and a prominent political figure in the city. Peterson graduated from Mercy Academy, and received a bachelors degree in international business and marketing from Howard University in Washington, D.C., in 1991. Peterson then returned to New Orleans to receive a law degree from Tulane University in 1995. She is a practicing attorney with the firm the Davillier Law Group
Peterson is a political protégé of Jim Singleton, a former city councilman and the leader of the powerful Black Organization for Leadership Development (BOLD), which has repeatedly aligned itself in opposition to William J. Jefferson and his Progressive Democrats. With the help of BOLD, Peterson was elected in 1999 to the Louisiana state legislature as a representative for the 93rd district, which encompasses New Orleans’s CBD, the upper French Quarter, and parts of Central City and Mid-City. In the state legislature, she was one of the most vocal supporters of a plan to reform the New Orleans public school system by putting it under state control, and was a backer of the levee board consolidation bill.
Peterson was a candidate for U.S. Congress in Louisiana's 2nd congressional district (map) in the mid-term election of November 2006. She, along with several other candidates, challenged incumbent Democrat Bill Jefferson, who was already the subject of an FBI investigation. She finished in second place with 19,972 votes (21.6% of the total votes cast), and therefore she and Jefferson entered a runoff round of voting on December 9, 2006. Jefferson prevailed by a 57%-43% margin, the lowest since his original election in 1990.[2]
In the 2006 Congressional election, Peterson received endorsements from prominent Republican businessmen Joe Canizaro and Boysie Bollinger. She was also endorsed by both the Louisiana state and Orleans Parish branches of the Democratic Party, a normally unusual development given that the parties usually support their incumbent members, but with the recent allegations against Jefferson, it was not a big surprise. She centered her campaign around the argument that Jefferson's corruption scandal left New Orleans with a lack of credible and respected representation in Congress.[3] Jefferson, in turn, accused Peterson of profiting from no-bid "sweetheart" contracts with the New Orleans City Council as their legal advisor for utility regulation. Jefferson was subsequently defeated by Republican Joseph Cao in 2008 and convicted of 11 felonies in 2009.[4]
Although generally a proponent of restrictions on state government spending instead of tax increases to close budgetary shortfalls, Peterson, an avowed non-smoker, supports higher taxes on tobacco and use of the consequent revenue to fund priorities of the Louisiana Healthier Families Act.[5] Her 2009 House Bill 889 (Louisiana Healthier Families Act), after heavy lobbying by both sides, failed in the Louisiana House of Representatives; she attributed the loss to "the national ambition of our governor" Bobby Jindal, assumed to be interested in the Presidency and wanting to seek that higher office without a tax increase on his record.[6]
Peterson drew the ire of a Jindal ally, Louisiana Republican Party State Chairman Roger Villere, of Metairie in Jefferson Parish. Villere called upon Peterson to release certain public information about herself to him. At least two Republican lawmakers, Joe Harrison of Napoleonville and Ernest Wooton of Belle Chasse, defended Peterson and urged Villere to apologize or to step down from the chairmanship. Villere's open records request had come after Peterson had criticized Governor Jindal.[7]
Peterson lives in New Orleans’ Warehouse District. She is married to Dana Peterson, a political consultant.[1] The couple has no children. She appears in Spike Lee's documentary about Hurricane Katrina, When the Levees Broke.[8] Carter Peterson's sense of humor was manifest during the closing days of the 2009 legislative regular session when a cabinet official in Governor Bobby Jindal's administration accidentally coughed on her after he had tested positive for swine flu virus; the following day, Carter Peterson emerged in the House chamber wearing a hospital mask, prompting colleague state representative Jared Brossett to move that the House be "fully quarantined" until the plague subsided.[9]
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