Mark Keam is running for the Virginia House of Delegates

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Korean American Mark Keam is vying for an open seat at the Virginia House of Delegates 35th House District (ie Fairfax, etc) for the June Primary. If elected, Mark would be the very first Asian American elected to the Virginia General Assembly.

Mark is currently an attorney who has served as Chief Legal Counsel to Senator Dick Durbin and in the Clinton Administration at the FCC and Small Business Administration. Keam has been a long time Democratic activist involved in local, state and national elections, Keam was one of the founders of “Fairfax for Obama” a grassroots organization which formed following Obama’s announcement to run for President in Feb 2007.

Early Years and Education
Mark was born in Seoul, Korea, the youngest child of a Presbyterian minister. At age four, Mark and his family moved to Vietnam where his father established a church. In 1975, when Vietnam fell to communism, Mark and his family fled the war-torn country. They then moved to Australia, where his father established another church.

Mark’s family eventually moved to America, settling in Orange County, California. While his father began a small church, his mother worked on a factory assembly line. Mark helped supplement the family income with a series of part-time and summer jobs, including factory labor, construction, and collecting shopping carts from a retail parking lot.

Mark attended the University of California at Irvine, a local public college made affordable by student loans and work-study programs. Mark was active with various student government activities and a host of campus organizations. As a political science major, he helped start the pre-law chapter of Phi Alpha Delta.

In 1988, Mark worked as an intern at the Democratic National Committee. Not only was this his first trip to the East Coast, he was housed in an apartment in Falls Church, which allowed him to learn the history and culture of the Commonwealth of Virginia. That summer, Mark worked at the Democratic National Convention in Atlanta where the Dukakis-Bentsen ticket was nominated.

Mark fell in love with campaigns, politics, policy, and government, and he vowed to pursue a career in this field. Mark entered the University of Hastings, College of Law, the same year that Bill Clinton became president. Mark was elected a first year representative in student government, and served on law review. To prepare for a career in government, Mark clerked for the U.S. Attorney’s office and for the San Francisco City Attorney’s office.

Government and Public Service
After graduating from law school, Mark moved back to Virginia to work for the Federal Communications Commission as an enforcement trial attorney. In 1998, Mark became an assistant to a Senate-confirmed presidential appointee at the Small Business Administration. As a policy advocate, Mark worked with Congress and federal agencies to assist small businesses that competed with larger entities.

At the end of the Clinton-Gore Administration in 2001, Mark moved to the legislative branch, where he joined the staff of U.S. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois who is now the Assistant Senate Majority Leader. Mark served as Chief Counsel for Senator Durbin on the high profile Senate Judiciary Committee, where Mark supported the Democrats’ efforts to fight the right wing agenda.

Mark was also on the frontlines of the heated partisan Senate confirmation battles over dozens of President George W. Bush’s executive and judicial branch appointments, including three Supreme Court nominations.

As a Hill staffer, Mark was always a fierce and reliable advocate for strongly-held progressive Democratic values. But he also gained a solid reputation for his ability to reach across the aisle to seek common sense solutions in order to achieve reasonable bipartisan results.

Helping Democrats Succeed
In February 2007, Mark left Congress to join the private sector in the communications field where he began his legal career a dozen years earlier. In the same week, Barack Obama announced his candidacy for the President of the United States.

Having worked for the senior Senator from Illinois, Mark had a chance to work with President Barack Obama since he first ran for U.S. Senate in 2004. Mark joined the Obama presidential campaign from the start as a volunteer, and worked across the country on a variety of outreach projects.

A few months before the Virginia primary election, Mark helped found “Fairfax for Obama,” a large grassroots volunteer effort of Democratic activists. The group helped deliver an upset Obama victory in the most populous county in the Commonwealth. Mark continued to recruit local volunteers, supported Obama in other states, assisted the campaign staff transition into Fairfax County, and worked throughout the general election to turn Virginia blue for the first time in 44 years. Because of his leadership role, Mark was elected by fellow Virginia Democrats to attend the Democratic National Convention in Denver as an at large pledged Obama delegate.

Mark has also worked on many other campaigns for Virginia Democrats, including Mark Warner’s campaign for Governor and two races for the Senate, Gerry Connolly for Congress, Chap Petersen for State Senate, Jim Webb for Senate, Tim Kaine for Governor, Steve Shannon for Delegate, Don Beyer for Governor, and Tom Horton for Congress. Most recently, Mark served as the Hunter Mill Magisterial District Coordinator for Sharon Bulova’s campaign for Fairfax County Chairman.

As an active grassroots volunteer, Mark is a member of the Fairfax County Democratic Committee, the Providence District Democratic Committee, Northern Virginia Democratic Business Council, Dulles Area Democrats, and the Korean American Democrats of Virginia.

Family
Mark has been married to Alex Seong Keam for over ten years, and they have two wonderful children, Tyler Jefferson (7) and Brenna Nicole (5). Tyler and Brenna were born at Inova Fairfax hospital, and they attend first grade and kindergarten at Marshall Road Elementary School in Vienna. Tyler is a proud Tiger Cub, while Brenna is a budding Daisy Scout.

Alex is also a Korean immigrant, who came to Maryland’s eastern shore at age six. She works fulltime as a trademark examining attorney for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Old Town Alexandria. The Keams reside in Vienna near Oakton (Providence District, Nottoway Precinct).

Community and Volunteer Activities
* Past President, Courthouse Oaks Homeowners Association, Vienna
* Den Parent, Boy Scouts Vienna Pack 1139
* Member, Vienna-Tysons Regional Chamber of Commerce
* Member, Leadership Greater Washington’s Class of 2001
* Member, Governor’s Asian American Advisory Board
* Member, Fairfax County Democratic Committee
* Member, Providence District Democratic Committee
* Member, Democratic Party of Virginia Resolutions Committee
* Member, Northern Virginia Democratic Business Council
* Member, Dulles Area Democrats
* Member, The Brigades
* Magisterial District Coordinator, Sharon Bulova for Fairfax County Chairman
* Co-founder and Coordinator, Fairfax for Obama
* Co-founder, Coalition of Asian Pacific Americans of Virginia
* Co-founder, Immigrant Rights Coalition of Greater Washington
* Member, American Bar Association
* Member, Federal Communications Bar Association
* Former president, Asian Pacific American Bar Association
* Former director, Korean American Coalition’s citizenship drive project
* Former member, DC Hate Crimes Task Force
* Former facilitator, Community Foundation for the National Capitol Region’s Building One Neighborhood project