Terri Sewell | |
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![]() Official portrait | |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Alabama's 7th district | |
Assumed office January 3, 2011 | |
Preceded by | Artur Davis |
Personal details | |
Born | Terrycina Andrea Sewell January 1, 1965 Huntsville, Alabama, U.S. |
Political party | Democratic |
Spouse |
Theodore Dixie (divorced) |
Relations | Briana Sewell (cousin) |
Education | Princeton University (AB) St Hilda's College, Oxford (MA) Harvard University (JD) |
Website | House website |
Terrycina Andrea "Terri" Sewell (/ˈsjuːəl/; born January 1, 1965)[1][2] is an American lawyer and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, she has served since 2011 as the U.S. representative for Alabama's 7th congressional district, which includes most of the Black Belt, as well as most of the predominantly African American portions of Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, and Montgomery.
A native of Huntsville, Sewell studied at Princeton University, Harvard Law School, and St Hilda's College at the University of Oxford. Before entering politics, she was a securities lawyer for Davis Polk & Wardwell and a public finance lawyer for Maynard, Cooper & Gale, where she was the first Black woman to make partner. She is the first African-American woman elected to Congress from Alabama and, along with Republican Martha Roby,[3] was one of the first women elected to Congress from Alabama in a regular election.[4] Sewell has been the only Democrat in Alabama's House delegation during her entire term in office, and apart from Doug Jones's U.S. Senate tenure from 2018 to 2021 she has also been the state's only congressional Democrat.