Kenyan McDuffie, a Howard University alumnus and fourth-generation Washingtonian, announced in January that he was joining the Washington D.C. mayoral race. McDuffie’s website highlights his journey from ‘mailman to mayor,’ and lays out his vision for a nicer, safer and more inclusive city.
Born in 1975 into a ‘tight-knit’ community in Northeast called Stronghold, McDuffie is no stranger to life in the nation’s capital. For McDuffie, Stronghold is a family legacy; his family still lives in the house his grandparents bought in 1952, just a few years after the Supreme Court ruled in Shelley v. Kramer that housing covenants restricting certain races from property sales could not be legally enforced. Watching his grandparents and other residents from Stronghold maintain their community defines McDuffie’s commitment to public service.
“[They] helped to shape my view about government and how it could be used as a tool to help those at the lower end of the socio-economic totem pole,” said McDuffie…