Suzan DelBene has represented Washington’s First Congressional District since 2012, and has been a strong advocate for our region in Washington, D.C.
Growing up, Suzan saw her parents struggle financially, constantly moving as they looked for work.
With the help of student loans and financial aid, Suzan worked her way through college and earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Reed College in Portland, Oregon. She later received a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Washington.
After college Suzan worked in the lab doing immunology research and later embarked on a 20-year career as a technology entrepreneur and business leader. She worked for over 12 years at Microsoft, most recently as a corporate vice president running worldwide sales, marketing, and product management for the company’s mobile technology business.
She also helped start drugstore.com as its original vice president of marketing and store development. She also has served as CEO and president of the startup company Nimble Technology.
Beyond her private sector experience, public service and helping others has always been central to Suzan’s story. It is a key reason she decided to seek public office. She was an adviser to Global Partnerships, a microfinance non-profit focused on providing much-needed loans to help create economic opportunities for people living in poverty. She has also worked as a volunteer with the YWCA to build programs that provide transitional housing and job training to women and families struggling to get back on their feet.
In 2010, Suzan was appointed by Governor Chris Gregoire to be the Director of the Washington State Department of Revenue. During one of the most difficult budget challenges in state history, Suzan worked to streamline government, cutting red tape for small businesses. She also implemented an innovative program that helped close a multimillion dollar state budget gap while easing the tax burden on small businesses.
In Congress, Suzan is prioritizing building an economy that works for everyone from the bottom up, defending reproductive freedoms for all and lowering housing costs for working families.
Suzan is an original co-sponsor of the Women’s Health Reproduction Act, which would enshrine the protections of Roe for everyone, everywhere in the country. As a member of the Ways and Means committee she is a leader on making the expanded Child Tax Credit permanent, which helped cut the nation’s child poverty rate in half, and of a bipartisan proposal to help build 2 million more units of affordable housing.
Suzan has fought tirelessly to protect Americans’ privacy by reforming outdated laws that don’t account for the way technology works today and by reining-in government surveillance programs that impact law-abiding Americans. She has also introduced legislation to make college more affordable, address climate change, protect farmers, expand public lands protections, and scrap the income contribution cap on the wealthiest Americans to keep Social Security solvent for more than 40 years.
Suzan has served in several key leadership roles for House Democrats over the years, including as a Finance Co-Chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) in 2018, a year Democrats reclaimed the House Majority and as Chair of the New Democrat Coalition last Congress. Now, as the Chair of the DCCC, Suzan is building a team to win back the House Majority in 2024 and make Leader Hakeem Jeffries the first Black Speaker of the House.
With a lifetime of business experience and community service, Suzan brings a depth and history of achieving results that are essential in today’s divisive political environment.
Suzan and her husband Kurt have two children, a granddaughter, and a dog named Reily, and are proud to call the First District home.
