Renitta Shanbay Shannon (born December 29, 1979) is an American politician who currently serves as a Democratic member of the

Georgia House of Representatives The Georgia House of Representatives is the lower house of the Georgia General Assembly (the state legislature) of the U.S. state of Georgia. There are currently 180 elected members. Republicans have had a majority in the chamber since 2005. T ...

. In 2016, Shannon defeated a four-term Democratic incumbent. In January 2017, she was sworn into the Georgia State House of Representatives to represent the 84th district. In 2017, she came out as bisexual, making her the first bisexual legislator to serve in the

Georgia General Assembly The Georgia General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is bicameral, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. Each of the General Assembly's 236 members serve two-year terms and are directly ...

Early life

Shannon was born in

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. After college, she worked in business development for a variety of sectors including mental health and financial services. In a 2019 interview, she said that she spent most of her free time as an activist on racial justice, economic justice, criminal justice, and equality issues, including as an organizer for various

progressive Progressive may refer to: Politics * Progressivism, a political philosophy in support of social reform ** Progressivism in the United States, the political philosophy in the American context * Progressive realism, an American foreign policy par ...

grassroots organizations.

Career

She defeated incumbent representative

Rahn Mayo Rahn Mayo is a former Democratic Party (United States), Democratic member of the Georgia House of Representatives, serving from 2009 until January 2017. In addition to his service in the legislature, Mayo has also worked as a real estate broker, ...

in the Democratic primaries in 2016, and went on to win the seat unopposed in the 2016 general election. According to Shannon, she ran for office "to fight for policies that truly support women, working people, and people of color" and has written about improving representation and of electing queer black women into public office. In her 2019–2020 term, she was appointed the Chair of the House Democratic Criminal Justice Reform Committee and is a member of the Governmental Affairs, Small Business Development, and Insurance committees positions she continued in for her 2021–2022 term, with the addition of the State Planning and Community Affairs Committee. She is a running for

Lieutenant Governor of Georgia The lieutenant governor of Georgia is a constitutional officer of the State of Georgia, elected to a four-year term by popular vote. Unlike in some other U.S. states, the lieutenant governor is elected on a separate ticket from the Governor of ...

in the 2022 election.

References

External links

*
Legislative homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shannon, Renitta 1979 births 20th-century African-American people 20th-century African-American women 21st-century African-American people 21st-century African-American women African-American state legislators in Georgia (U.S. state) Bisexual politicians Bisexual women LGBT African Americans LGBT state legislators in Georgia (U.S. state) Living people Democratic Party members of the Georgia House of Representatives People from Decatur, Georgia Women state legislators in Georgia (U.S. state)