Elizabeth Warren | Attorney

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About Elizabeth

Elizabeth Ann Warren is the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts. Like many politicians, she began with a career in law before transitioning to politics. She has also taught law at the University of Texas School of Law, the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and Harvard Law School. As a lawyer, Warren earned a reputation in commercial law with a specialty in bankruptcy law.

In 1970, Warren graduated from the University of Houston with a B.S. in speech pathology and audiology. After completing her studies, she spent a year teaching children with disabilities in the public school system. Warren later moved to New Jersey and enrolled at the Rutgers School of Law-Newark. She worked as a summer associate with Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft before graduating in 1976.

For two decades, Warren's primary occupation was teaching law. She worked at universities around the country, researching bankruptcy and middle-class personal finance issues and developing an interest in consumer protection.  Her academic career began at Rutgers, where she lectured from 1977-1978. Warren then relocated to the University of Houston Law Center and gained tenure in 1981. She started work as a visiting professor at the University of Texas School of Law in the same year, then earned a full-time position for the school from 1983-1987. Simultaneously she taught as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan and performed research at the University of Texas at Austin's Population Research Center. Warren secured a full-time teaching position at the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1987 and earned an endowed chair there in 1990. Two years later, she accepted a teaching position at Harvard Law School.

Starting in 1995, Warren's expertise was sought as an advisor to the National Bankruptcy Review commission, working mostly to oppose impending legislation to restrict consumers' rights to file for bankruptcy. Warren was a member of the FDIC Advisory Committee on Economic Inclusion from 2006-2010, and she laid the foundation for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in 2011.

In the fall of 2011, Warren entered the 2012 election campaign for the US Senate as a Massachusetts representative. In 2012, she defeated the incumbent senator to become the first female US senator from Massachusetts. As senator, Warren continued questioning the power of large banks in the US economy. She introduced legislation, with bipartisan support, to reduce the risk of a future financial crisis.

Education

University of Houston

B.S. (Speech pathology and audiology)

1970

Recognitions & Achievements

Honors / Awards
  • named Bostonian of the Year by The Boston Globe
    2009
  • Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World
    2009
  • named one of the 40 most influential attorneys of the decade by the National Law Journal
    2010
  • Leila J. Robinson award – Women’s Bar Association of Massachusetts
  • Sacks-Freund Teaching Award - Harvard Law School

Notable Work

Publications

The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke


A Fighting Chance


This Fight is Our Fight: The Battle to Save America’s Middle Class