Who is Stacey Plaskett? First delegate to serve as impeachment manager wanted to be part of Trump's 2019 trial
Rep Stacey Plaskett, 54, a delegate from the US Virgin Islands, is currently one of the nine Democrats who have the job to prosecute the House's impeachment case against ex-president Donald Trump. According to reports on Wednesday, February 10, 2021, Plaskett had presented "new evidence" during the trial which involved the showing of videos of January 6 Capitol riot that had not been released. She said that the former twice impeached president had "fanned the flame of violence, and it worked."
According to an ABC news article, Plaskett said, "I want to show you why this violence was foreseeable and why Donald Trump was different than any other politician just telling their fighters — their supporters, to fight for something. The violence that occurred on Jan 6, like the attack itself, did not just appear." She added, "You'll see that Donald Trump knew the people he was inciting, he saw the violence that they were capable of, and he had a pattern and practice of praising and encouraging that violence, never, ever condemning it."
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Who is Stacey Plaskett?
In the 1990s, the publication revealed that Plaskett was a law student of Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin, a lead impeachment manager and a former constitutional law professor at American University’s Washington College of Law. It was, in fact, Raskin who had introduced Plaskett on Wednesday afternoon as the first delegate to participate in a Senate trial.
The manager also praised his former student saying, "I hope I'm not violating any records or laws saying she was an A student then and an A+ student now", and also added that it was a "moment of special pride".
Speaking of this historic moment, she said, “I’ve learned throughout my life that preparation and truth can carry you far, can allow you to speak truth to power. I’ve learned that as a young Black girl growing up in the projects in Brooklyn, a housing community on St Croix, sent to the most unlikeliest of settings and now as an adult woman representing an island territory speaking to the U.S. Senate.”
Forbes posted a tweet about this moment along with a video of Plaskett speaking; you can watch it below:
TRUMP TRIAL: Del. Stacey Plaskett opens on a personal note: “Preparation and truth can carry you far, can allow you to speak truth to power. I’ve learned that as a young Black girl growing up in the projects in Brooklyn.” pic.twitter.com/q3JF9LRHaB
— Forbes (@Forbes) February 10, 2021
Plaskett was born on May 13, 1966, in Brooklyn New York, and also grew up in a John F Kennedy housing community on Saint Croix in the US Virgin Islands. Reportedly, her parents are from Saint Croix and moved to the Big Apple in the 1950's. Her father was a policeman in the city, and her mother, a clerk at the courts.
ABC reported that Plaskett had said during the tragic terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, in New York, that she was a congressional staffer. Speaking about the experience, she said, "My office was on the west front of the Capitol, I worked in the Capitol and I was on the House side. This year is 20 years since the attacks of Sept. 11 and almost every day, I remember 44 Americans gave their lives to stop the plane headed to this Capitol building. I thanked them every day for saving my life and the lives of so many others."
Plaskett is not only a politician but also an attorney and a commentator. She is the 5th Delegate to the United States House of Representatives from the United States Virgin Islands' and a member of the democratic party. Since she is a delegate, she is not allowed to vote in the House of Representatives, and so she was not one of the 232 congressmen that voted to impeach Trump back on January 13.
She graduated with a degree in history and diplomacy from Georgetown University and from American University’s Washington College of Law. From there, Vogue reported, that the delegate worked in the Bronz as an assistant attorney, as counsel the House ethics committee, and as a political appointee at the Justice Department under President George W Bush. It was in 2014 that she was elected to represent the US Virgin Islands in Congress as a non-voting member.
It was also reported that in 2019, Plaskett wrote to speaker Nancy Pelosi about wanting to be part of the impeachment team when Donald Trump was first impeached by the House. The letter in part read, "The party says that Black women are the base and our primary support, and there are five Black women in the House who are attorneys and only two of us are former prosecutors." Back then, Plaskett was not tasked with that assignment, but on Wednesday she was assigned to do just that. NPR also reported that while since Kamala Harris was no longer a senator and now the Vice President, Plaskett remains the "only Black woman in the chamber."
As for the Capitol attacks, Plaskett, a mother to five, had taken shelter in her office. Speaking of the insurrection, she said, "The chilling evidence shows that Jan 6, armed and organized insurrectionists trained their sights on Speaker Pelosi. They sought out the speaker on the floor and in her office, publicly declared their intent to harm or kill her, ransacked her office, and terrorized her staff. And they did it because Donald Trump sent them on this mission."