Cynthia McKinney - Early Life and Political Career

Early Life and Political Career

Cynthia McKinney was born in Atlanta, Georgia, the daughter of Leola McKinney, a retired nurse, and Billy McKinney, a law enforcement officer and former Georgia State Representative.

McKinney was exposed to the Civil Rights Movement through her father, an activist who regularly participated in demonstrations across the south. As a police officer, he challenged the discriminatory policies of the Atlanta Police Department, publicly protesting in front of the station, often carrying young McKinney on his shoulders. He became a state representative, and McKinney attributes her father's election victory after several failed attempts to the passage of the Voting Rights Act passed by Lyndon B. Johnson.

McKinney earned a B.A. in international relations from the University of Southern California, an M.A. in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. She worked as a high school teacher and later as a university professor.

Her political career began in 1986 when her father, a representative in the Georgia House of Representatives, submitted her name as a write-in candidate for the Georgia state house. She got about 40% of the popular vote, despite the fact that she lived in Jamaica at the time with then-husband Coy Grandison (with whom she had a son, Coy McKinney, born in 1985). In 1988, McKinney ran for the same seat and won, making the McKinneys the first father and daughter to simultaneously serve in the Georgia state house.

In 1991, she spoke aggressively against the Gulf War, causing many legislators to walk out in protest of her remarks.

In 2007, McKinney moved from her longtime residence in the Atlanta suburb of Stone Mountain to California.