William Lacy Clay, Jr.

Congressman William Lacy Clay, Jr. represented Missouri’s 1st Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2001 to 2021 (107th-116th Congresses). Clay won election to Congress following the retirement of his father, Representative William Clay, Sr. Before Congress, Clay served in the Missouri House of Representatives and the Missouri Senate. During Clay’s 17 years in the Missouri legislature, he authored Missouri’s Hate Crimes Law, which included gender, sexual orientation, and sexual identity in the criteria for what constitutes a hate crime. During his Congressional tenure, Clay served on the Financial Services, Government Reform, Natural Resources, and Oversight and Reform committees. He was chair of the Financial Services’ Housing, Community Development, and Insurance Subcommittee and the Oversight and Government Reform Committees’ Information Policy, Census, and National Archives Subcommittee. Clay earned a bachelor’s degree in Political Science and a paralegal certificate from the University of Maryland, College Park. He is also a graduate of Howard University School of Law.