Liz Miranda


Elizabeth "Liz" Miranda is a Cape Verdean-American community organizer and politician. Since January 2019, Miranda has served as the Democratic Massachusetts State Representative for the Fifth Suffolk district. Her district comprises parts of the Dorchester and Roxbury neighborhoods of Boston.

Early life and education

Miranda was born on June 29, 1981 in a poor area of Dorchester, Boston. Her mother was a high school junior at the time of Miranda's birth, motivating her to drop out of education and begin to work to support her family.
From 1998 to 2002, Miranda attended Wellesley College, from which she graduated after four years with a Bachelor of Arts in Africana studies and urban studies.

Death of her brother

On August 20, 2017, Miranda's 28-year-old brother, Michael A. Miranda, was shot and killed outside a nightclub in Boston's theater district. He was pronounced dead at 7:17 p.m. EST. This has inspired some of her campaign issues on stronger gun control, criminal justice reform, youth education and the treatment of the distribution and oversight of firearms as a federal issue.

2018 State House campaign

Citing President Trump's 2016 election as an important motivating factor, Miranda launched a campaign to seek the fifth Suffolk seat in the Massachusetts House of Representatives after the incumbent, Evandro Carvalho, opted not to run for reelection, launching instead an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic party's nomination in the position of Suffolk County district attorney.
She faced a largely contested Democratic primary, but garnered a total of 59.4 percent of the votes in a field of four declared candidates. In the general election, she faced Republican nominee Althea Garrison, a perennial candidate for the seat who had previously served as the district's representative from 1993 to 1995. Miranda won overwhelmingly in the general election, with 88.7 percent to Garrison's 11 percent. Subsequently, Miranda was sworn into the State House on January 2, 2019.