Cori Bush
#blackhistoryProfiles
Cori Bush is a lifelong activist and change agent. Most recently, in 2020, she became Missouri’s first Black congresswoman, advocating for progressive causes on an anti-violence platform.
Inspired by her grandmothers, Bush earned a diploma in 2008 from St. Louis’ Lutheran School of Nursing and became a triage nurse at SSM Health Saint Louis University Hospital and later nursing supervisor at Hopewell Health Centers., the Kingdom Embassy International Church in 2011.
Bush’s activism went national in 2014 after police murdered Michael Brown in Ferguson. She lead community demonstrations that spent more than 400 days protesting for justice, becoming a leading voice in the Black Lives Matter movement.
As a Nonviolence 365 Ambassador with the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change, Bush speaks openly about her interest in gun control and how herexperiences with homelessness and as a survivor of police, sexual, and domestic attacks shaped those belifs..
“The devastation and trauma that gun violence has inflicted on our community is unbearable, unjust, and unconscionable,” she said after the passage of the Enhanced Background Checks Act in March 2021
Bush also supports a $15 minimum wage, tuition-free college, and Medicare for All, things that have impacted her personally and would make immediate impact within many communities
“When we elect leaders who have lived the struggles of our communities, anything is possible,” she said on Twitter.