Tom Perez
Thomas Edward Perez is an American politician and attorney who served as the senior advisor to U.S. president Joe Biden and the director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs from 2023 to 2025. Perez previously served as the United States Secretary of Labor from 2013 to 2017, the chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2017 to 2021, and U.S. Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights from 2009 to 2013.
Born in Buffalo, New York, Perez is a graduate of Brown University, Harvard Law School, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government. After clerking for Judge Zita Weinshienk in Colorado, Perez served as a federal civil rights prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice, a staffer for Senator Ted Kennedy, and, in the final years of the Clinton administration, as the director of the Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Health and Human Services. Perez was elected to the Montgomery County Council in 2002, serving as the council's president from 2005 until the end of his tenure in 2006. He attempted to run for the Democratic nomination for attorney general of Maryland, but was disqualified for having insufficient time as a member of the Maryland state bar. In January 2007. Perez was appointed by Maryland governor Martin O'Malley as secretary of the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.
In October 2009, Perez was nominated by U.S. president Barack Obama and confirmed by the United States Senate as assistant attorney general. In 2013, Perez was nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the United States Senate to be the United States Secretary of Labor.
After the 2016 U.S. elections, Perez announced his candidacy for chair of the Democratic National Committee in the 2017 party election. After a tight race against Keith Ellison, Perez was elected chairman on the second ballot; he appointed Ellison as deputy chair. Perez declined to run for re-election as chair in 2021. Perez was a GU Politics Fellow at the Georgetown Institute of Politics and Public Service in 2021. Perez then ran for the Democratic nomination in the 2022 Maryland gubernatorial election, but lost to Baltimore author Wes Moore in the Democratic primary. He joined the Biden administration in June 2023.
Early life and education
Thomas Edward Perez was born and raised in Buffalo, New York, to parents Grace and Dr. Rafael Antonio de Jesús Pérez Lara, who had immigrated from the Dominican Republic.His father, who earned U.S. citizenship after enlisting in the U.S. Army after World War II, worked as a doctor in Atlanta, Georgia, before moving to Buffalo, where he worked as a physician at a Veterans Affairs hospital.
His mother, Grace, came to the United States in 1930 after her father, Rafael Brache, was appointed as the Dominican Republic's Ambassador to the United States. Brache was initially an ally of Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo, but after disagreements with the regime, he was declared an enemy of the state, forcing him and his family to remain in the United States.
Perez is the youngest of five brothers and sisters, all of whom but Perez followed their father in becoming physicians. His father died of a heart attack when Perez was 12 years old. He attended in Amherst, New York until the 8th Grade. Perez graduated from Canisius High School, an all boys Jesuit school in Buffalo, in 1979.
Perez received his Bachelor of Arts in international relations and political science from Brown University in 1983. He joined the Sigma Chi fraternity there. He covered the cost of attending Brown with scholarships and Pell Grants and by working as a trash collector and in a warehouse. He worked in Brown's dining hall and for the Rhode Island Commission for Human Rights.
In 1987, Perez received a Juris Doctor cum laude from Harvard Law School and a Master of Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government.
In 1986, while a student at Harvard, Perez worked as a law clerk for Attorney General Edwin Meese.
Early career
After graduating from Harvard, Perez worked as a law clerk for Judge Zita Weinshienk of the United States District Court for the District of Colorado from 1987 to 1989.From 1989 to 1995, he worked as a federal prosecutor in the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division. He later served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights under Attorney General Janet Reno. Perez chaired the interagency Worker Exploitation Task Force, which oversaw a variety of initiatives designed to protect workers.
From 1995 to 1998, Perez worked as Democratic Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy's principal adviser on civil rights, criminal justice, and constitutional issues. During the final two years of the second Clinton administration, he worked as the director of the Office for Civil Rights at the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
From 2001 to 2007, Perez was a professor at the University of Maryland School of Law, where he taught in the clinical law and the law and health program. He was a part-time member of the faculty at the George Washington University School of Public Health.
Montgomery County Council
In 2002, Perez ran for the county council of Montgomery County, Maryland from its 5th District, which covers Silver Spring, Kensington, Takoma Park, and Wheaton. His main challenge was the Democratic primary, where he faced Sally Sternbach, the head of the Silver Spring Citizens Advisory Board and the Greater Silver Spring Chamber of Commerce. He defeated Sternbach with the support of the AFL–CIO and other labor groups. He faced Republican Dennis E. Walsh in the general election and won with 76% of the vote, becoming the first Hispanic council member.Perez was on the council from 2002 to 2006. During that time, he served on the committees for Health and Human Services, and Transportation and the Environment. He also served as council president from 2004 to 2005. With council member Mike Subin, Perez pushed for legislation on predatory lending. The law allowed the county's Commission on Human Rights to investigate and prosecute loan brokers and third-party lenders engaging in predatory lending, raised the cap on compensation for victims, and required the commission to release an annual report on discriminatory and subprime lending in the county.
Perez opposed the privatization of the non-profit health insurer CareFirst, a non-stock holding, independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association that provided coverage in Maryland, Delaware, Washington, D.C., and Virginia. He lobbied for support on the county council and in the Maryland General Assembly against the sale of CareFirst to Wellpoint. He led the council to a unanimous vote against the acquisition, leading to the rejection of the merger by Maryland's Commissioner of Insurance.
In 2004, Perez, and fellow council member Marilyn Praisner introduced an initiative to provide affordable prescription drugs for county employees and retirees, setting up a voluntary program to import high-quality, lower priced prescription drugs from suppliers in Canada approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The initiative was overwhelmingly passed by the council, though Montgomery County was denied a waiver by the FDA through the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act, leading to a lawsuit by Montgomery County against Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt, where the U.S. District Court for Maryland granted the FDA the right to dismiss.
Maryland Attorney General campaign
After speculation arose that 20-year incumbent attorney general of Maryland J. Joseph Curran, Jr. would announce his retirement in 2006, Perez was seen as a top contender to replace Curran. On May 23, 2006, after Curran announced he would not run for re-election, Perez launched his candidacy, in a three-city tour with former Maryland Attorney General and United States Attorney Stephen H. Sachs. Perez was backed by labor groups such as Maryland's State Teachers Association and the Service Employees International Union.Perez's main challengers were Montgomery County State's Attorney Doug Gansler and Stuart O. Simms, a Baltimore lawyer who had served as Secretary of the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services. Gansler, who got an early start in campaign contributions, raised over $1.4 million, compared to Perez's $200,000.
During the campaign, questions were raised over whether Perez was permitted to run under Maryland's State Constitution, due to a requirement that candidates for attorney general must have at least 10 years of previous experience practicing law in Maryland; It wasn't until 2001 that Perez had become a member of the Maryland State Bar Association. The lawsuit was filed by Stephen N. Abrams, a member of the Montgomery County Board of Education and the 2006 Republican candidate for Comptroller of Maryland.
Abrams argued that it was "absolutely wrong to say that Perez met the 10-year requirement", after he was cleared by the Maryland State Board of Elections, and received legal advice from Attorney General Curran, who opined that Perez's time as a federal prosecutor in Maryland seemingly met the requirement. The lawsuit, which was brought before the Anne Arundel County Circuit Court, was rejected by that court two months before the primary. Abrams appealed, bringing the case before the Maryland Court of Appeals, Maryland's highest court. The Court of Appeals rejected Perez's bid for attorney general. Perez then shifted his resources to support Martin O'Malley in his successful 2006 campaign for Governor of Maryland.
Maryland Secretary of Labor
In January 2007, newly elected Governor Martin O'Malley selected Perez to run the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.In that role, Perez led efforts to target Maryland companies who were engaging in workplace fraud, imposing new restrictions on the employee misclassification as independent contractors. He helped with the implementation of H.R. 1590, the Workplace Fraud Act of 2009, imposing penalties for employers who falsely classified their employees as independent contractors, actions involving tax evasion by the employers as well as the denial of worker protections and health insurance benefits to employees. In May 2009, Governor O'Malley signed the act into law, with Perez saying that the act would "ensure that employers who attempt to cheat the system, their workers and their competitors, will pay a steep price for their actions".
In 2004, then-Governor Robert Ehrlich vetoed an attempt to implement a living wage law in Maryland. Perez helped lead the reintroduction of a similar bill in 2007. After the bill passed and was signed by Governor O'Malley, Perez announced new provisions for out-of-state contractors and subcontractors doing business in Maryland, subjecting them to the same standards as in-state businesses.
Perez was a top adviser to O'Malley on Maryland's healthcare workforce shortage. Perez helped develop a plan relieving the chronic shortage of nurses in Maryland, allowing immigrants who have nursing qualifications in their home countries to have their certifications count towards becoming a registered nurse in the state.
Perez served as co-chair of the Maryland Workforce Creation and Adult Education Transition Council, alongside Maryland State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick, after Governor O'Malley moved the Maryland Adult Education and Literacy Services Program, the adult correctional education, and the GED Testing Office from the Department of Education to the Department of Labor. The council oversaw the extensive transition process, while commissioning a report on proposals to revamp the state adult education system and identifying inefficiencies in the state correctional education budget. Though the shift of the programs to the DLLR was proposed to allow the state to save money and create a more unified workforce system, the decision was criticized by adult education providers in the state and was seen as a political move by O'Malley to undermine control of the agency by Superintendent Grasmick.
During his first term as governor, O'Malley pushed proposals to expand gambling in Maryland, with Perez spearheading the legalization of slot machines in the state. The legislation was a central part of a plan to raise revenue to close Maryland's budget deficit, though Perez was criticized by many in his own party who saw the measure as a regressive way to raise revenue. Perez commissioned a report led by the DLLR arguing that the legalization of slots would be necessary to preserve Maryland's horse racing and breeding industries, with new revenue helping to address the issues of public education and school construction. The plan was approved in a state referendum by voters in the 2008 election, allowing 15,000 new slot machines in the state.