Exec launches bid against Markey
Pemberton wrote memoir about life in foster care
Business executive Steve Pemberton, a New Bedford native who authored a best-selling memoir on his childhood in the foster care system, launched a Democratic primary challenge to U.S. Sen. Ed Markey on Tuesday.
Pemberton, 52, joins Boston human rights attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan in taking on the state’s junior senator.
Pemberton told the Herald his congressional run is “less about running against Ed Markey” and more about bringing generational change to Washington.
“I do think there’s an opportunity for new people with a new set of experiences from a different generation to represent those voices in Washington, D.C., and I believe I can do that,” Pemberton said.
When it comes to Markey, Pemberton said, “We can honor and respect his career, and at the same time suggest there is an opportunity — and there should always be an opportunity — to pass the torch.”
Pemberton seeks to follow the path of U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, who toppled former congressman Mike Capuano last year, and other insurgents mounting primary challenges to incumbents. Pemberton says he sees Pressley’s campaign and similar bids not as “exceptions” but as “reflections” on the need for more inclusivity and diversity.
Pemberton is building his campaign on issues that hit close to home — income inequality, access to quality health care and addiction. Pemberton’s mother battled alcoholism and he lost his father to gun violence, landing him in foster homes he described as “often cruel and violent” for 13 years.
He graduated from Boston College in 1989 and began his career in college admissions. He left the state in 2011 but returned in 2017 for his current role as chief human resource officer at the technology company Workhuman in Framingham, where he also lives. He and his wife, Tonya, have three teenage children.
Pemberton kicked off his campaign Tuesday in his hometown of New Bedford, before traveling to a Jamaica Plain cafe to meet with supporters.
Pemberton called his Senate run a “continuation of the path that I’ve been on my entire professional career. I was focused always on creating a more inclusive, more accessible society, particularly for those struggling and fighting to find a chance.”
Pemberton supports the Green New Deal, which Markey cosponsored with freshman U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. He called health care a “fundamental human right” and wants to expand access to it. And Pemberton said he would support impeaching President Trump, whom he called “unfit for office.”