Shomari Figures

Biography & Campaign Analysis

Background

Shomari Figures, whose full name is Shomari Coleman Figures, was born in Mobile, Alabama, on September 3, 1985.

His father, Michael Figures, was a civil rights attorney and a member of the Alabama Senate, and his mother, Vivian Davis Figures, succeeded her husband in the Alabama Senate after his death. Figures was raised in Mobile and graduated from LeFlore Magnet High School.

He earned a Bachelor of Arts in criminal justice and history from the University of Alabama in 2006 and a Juris Doctor from the University of Alabama School of Law in 2010.

He married Kalisha Dessources, whom he met in 2014 while both worked at the White House, on December 2, 2018, and they have three children.

Career

After law school, Shomari Figures clerked for Nannette A. Baker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and worked as a field organizer in Akron, Ohio, for Barack Obama's 2012 reelection campaign.

In the Obama administration he served as domestic director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office and then as White House liaison to Attorney General Loretta Lynch.

He later became legislative counsel for U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, worked on the presidential transition of Joe Biden, and served as deputy chief of staff and counselor to Attorney General Merrick Garland until resigning in October 2023.

After Allen v. Milligan led to the 2nd district being redrawn with a contiguous Black majority, Figures ran for the seat in 2024.

He led the 11-candidate Democratic primary with 44% of the vote, defeated Alabama House Minority Leader Anthony Daniels with 61% in the April runoff, and beat Republican Caroleene Dobson in the general election.

He was sworn in on January 3, 2025, and in the 119th Congress he sits on the Committee on Agriculture and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

2026 race

Shomari Figures is the Democratic nominee in the 2026 election for Alabama's 2nd congressional district, the seat he won in 2024 with 54.6% of the vote.

Under the legislature-approved redistricted map, the district was redrawn to include southeastern parts of the Wiregrass Region that previously belonged to the 1st district, including Coffee County, while keeping Montgomery County.

Figures was the Democratic nominee in both the nonbinding primary and the special Democratic primary. In the November 3, 2026, general election he faces Republican Rhett Marques, a state representative from the 91st district who won the special Republican primary with 50.0% of the vote.