By NAN Staff Writer
News Americas, WASHINGTON, D.C, Tues. Jan. 26, 2021: USVI Delegate to Congress, Stacey Plaskett, is the lone Caribbean representative among eight other Democrats who will serve as an impeachment manager in the second trial of Donald J. Trump. On Monday, she and her colleagues walked over the articles of impeachment to the Senate. Here are five things to know about her:
1: She was born Stacey Elizabeth Plaskett on May 13, 1966 in Brooklyn, New York. Her parents are both from Saint Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, and moved to New York in the 1950s during the large migration of Virgin Islanders seeking economic opportunity. Plaskett grew up in the Bushwick, New York housing projects. Her father was a New York City police officer and her mother a clerk in the court system. Plaskett lived in the John F. Kennedy housing community on St. Croix during her early childhood as her family regularly returned to the Virgin Islands during her childhood.
2: Plaskett attended Brooklyn Friends, a Quaker School, and Grace Lutheran for elementary school. She was recruited by A Better Chance, Inc. a non-profit organization recruiting minority students to selective secondary schools and was a student at the boarding school, Choate Rosemary Hall, where she was a varsity athlete and served as class president for several years. Plaskett spent a term abroad during her time in France and graduated with a degree in History and Diplomacy from the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in 1988 where she was accepted under the early decision program. She received her J.D. degree from American University Washington College of Law after attending at night while she worked full-time during the day with the lobbying arm of the American Medical Association and then with the law firm, Jones Day.
3: After graduating from law school, Plaskett was hired as an Assistant District Attorney in the Bronx, New York. She prosecuted several hundred cases and was eventually in the Narcotics Bureau. She then worked as a consultant and legal counsel focused on internal corporate investigations and strategy for the Mitchell Madison Group, a spin-off from McKinsey & Company. Plaskett moved to Washington, DC and worked as counsel on the Republican-led US House of Representatives, Committee on Standards of Official Conduct; the Ethics Committee. Plaskett left the Committee when she was asked by mentor and fellow trustee at Choate, Robert McCallum (prominent Republican and later Ambassador to Australia) to work at the Justice Department as a Republican political appointee of President George W. Bush
4: She accepted the offer and served as Counsel for the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division, and also as Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Torts Branch in the Civil Division. Plaskett then worked on the staff of Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson, primarily working on the Justice Honors program and an initiative to increase the number of minority and women attorneys at the Justice Department.
While in the Justice Civil Division, she also worked on the Terrorism Litigation Task Force and the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. During her time at Justice her boss, Larry Thompson, resigned and was replaced by James Comey, who opted to retain Plaskett. Plaskett left government to be a deputy general counsel at United Health Group, where she worked in the Medicaid/Medicare division: Americhoice under the leadership of Anthony Welters. She then relocated full-time to her ancestral home of the US Virgin Islands and worked in the private sector and then with the Virgin Islands Economic Development Authority. There she worked on tax incentive programs and public private partnerships trying to bring economic growth to the development of the territory.
5: Plaskett switched from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party in late 2008. In 2012, Plaskett challenged nine-term delegate Donna Christian-Christensen in the Democratic Party Primary in the USVI. Plaskett was unsuccessful but ran again in 2014. In the Democratic Primary held on August 2, she faced Shawn-Micheal Malone, a Virgin Islands Senator, and Senate President, and Emmett Hansen, a former Virgin Islands Senator and Former chair of the Democratic Party of the Virgin Islands.
She received 50.4% of the vote to Malone’s 41.61% and Hansen’s 7.92%. She later faced Republican Vince Danet in the General Election held on November 4 and received over 90% of the vote and to become the islands’ delegate in the US congress. Plaskett is married to Jonathan Buckney Small, a community activist and former professional tennis player. The couple has five children. Plaskett, 54, said she sheltered in her office during the storming of the United States Capitol and avoided contact with Republican colleagues who refused to wear face masks. She has written on Facebook that: “With God’s grace… I’m ready.”
The managers’ job is to take the case of impeachment against President Trump to the Senate for trial. Democrats have impeached Trump in the House for inciting his supporters during a rally on Jan. 6, 2021 in Washington, D.C. to storm the Capitol, which led to a violent mob overtaking the Capitol Building leading to the death of five people, including two Capitol police officers. Maryland Democrat Rep. Jamie Raskin is the lead impeachment manager. The other managers are: Democratic Reps. David Cicilline of Rhode Island, Diana DeGette of Colorado, Ted Lieu of California, Joaquin Castro of Texas, Madeleine Dean of Pennsylvania, Eric Swalwell of California, and Joe Neguse of Colorado. The trial is expected to begin the week of February 8.
