Bakari Sellers


Bakari T. Sellers is an American attorney, political commentator, and politician. He represented South Carolina's 90th district in the lower house of the state legislature from 2006 to 2014, becoming the youngest African American elected official in the country at age 22. He vacated his seat in the South Carolina House of Representatives to run for Lieutenant Governor that year, but lost to Henry McMaster. He was succeeded in the House by Justin T. Bamberg.
Sellers is also the first vice chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party.

Early life and education

Sellers was born on September 18, 1984, and is the son of Gwendolyn Sellers and civil rights activist and professor Cleveland Sellers. He grew up in Bamberg County, South Carolina, and was educated at Orangeburg-Wilkinson High School, a public high school in Orangeburg, South Carolina. In 2005, Sellers earned a bachelor's degree in African-American Studies from Morehouse College, a private all-male and historically black, liberal arts college, in Atlanta, Georgia. In 2008, he earned a juris doctor from the University of South Carolina School of Law. Sellers has worked for Congressman James Clyburn and former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin.

Career

Legal career

Sellers has been an attorney with the Strom Law Firm, L.L.C. in Columbia, South Carolina since 2007, and he is an analyst on CNN. He is also currently on the board of directors of Level Brands and Let America Vote.

Zionist advocacy

Sellers first attended the annual AIPAC conference while serving as student body president at Morehouse College. He has since become a prominent African-American Zionist. In 2016, he authored a letter signed by 60 fellow African-American politicians urging the Democratic Platform Committee to keep the same language, refusing to include the statement that Israel is engaging in an "occupation" of Palestine that appeared in previous Democratic platforms. Sellers received criticism from pro-Palestinian activists, and groups such as Black Lives Matter, for his opposition to including the word "occupation".

2019 Lincoln Memorial tweet

In response to the, which featured an incident between a teenager and Native American activist Nathan Phillips, Bakari tweeted about the teen: "He is a deplorable. Some ppl can also be punched in the face." As further video of the confrontation emerged, which undermined initial media reports that the teenager instigated the event, Bakari backtracked and deleted the tweet, claiming his comment was "metaphoric" and "taken out of context" though he still claimed that the students "displayed xenophobic, racist behavior." Bakari was later included in a lawsuit brought by the teen's parents against CNN, where Bakari worked as an analyst.

Honors, awards, and books

In 2010, Time magazine featured Sellers on its 40 Under 40 list. In 2012, Politico named Sellers on its "50 politicos to watch" list.
Sellers was named HBCU Top 30 Under 30 in July 2014.
In May 2020, Sellers released an autobiography, My Vanishing Country, that centers on the forgotten lives of African-American working class people in the rural U.S. South.

Personal life

In the summer of 2015, he married Ellen Rucker Carter, chiropractor and co-owner of Rucker Roots haircare products.