Senator Liz Miranda Contact information

Elizabeth Miranda, born on June 29, 1981, is a Cape Verdean-American community organizer and politician. She is currently serving as a state senator representing the Massachusetts Senate’s 2nd Suffolk district after winning a five-way Democratic Primary Election and advancing to an uncontested race in the 2022 Massachusetts general election. Prior to that, since January 2019, Miranda had served as the Democratic Massachusetts State Representative for the Fifth Suffolk district. Her district comprises parts of the Dorchester and Roxbury neighborhoods of Boston. She is a member of the Massachusetts Black and Latino Legislative Caucus. Miranda has passed legislation that aims to close racial disparities in maternal health outcomes of Black women, as well as legislation to advance environmental justice and was a lead author in the police reform omnibus legislation passed in 2021. In 2021, Miranda was named Best Politician by Boston Magazine and Progressive Legislator of the Year by Progressive Massachusetts.

Miranda was born in Roxbury, Boston. Her mother was a high school junior at the time of Miranda’s birth, motivating her to drop out of education and begin to work to support her family. Miranda is a graduate of the John D. O’Bryant High School of Math & Science in Roxbury. From 1998 to 2002, Miranda attended Wellesley College, from which she graduated after four years with a Bachelor of Arts in Africana studies and urban studies. Miranda started her community organizing work as a teen organizer with Nubian Roots Youth Committee of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Association, working on vacant land issues and environmental justice. On June 4, 2021, Miranda returned to her alma mater, Wellesley College, to give the commencement address for the Class of 2021. She noted how she was only 1 of 16 Black women to serve in this capacity as the commencement speaker. Miranda spoke about her experience growing up in Roxbury and Dorchester, and she spoke about her grandfather, Manuel Goncalves Miranda, who came to Boston in pursuit of the American Dream in 1976 from the newly freed colony of Cabo Verde on the west coast of Africa after a war led by Amílcar Cabral against Portuguese colonial rule.