Marc Berman
Assemblymember, District 23
Marc Berman was first elected to the California State Assembly in November 2016. He represents the 23rd Assembly District, which includes southern San Mateo County and northern Santa Clara County, spanning from the heart of Silicon Valley over the hill to the beautiful Coastside.
Marc has one of the highest rates of success in the Legislature, having sent 107 bills to the Governor in his first nine years in office – with 103 bills signed into law. He has championed legislation to make California a permanent vote-by-mail state, create the Where’s My Ballot tracking system so voters can track their ballots and make sure they are counted, make it easier for Californians to cancel their online subscriptions, end the puppy mill pipeline from out-of-state breeding operations, ensure that California students are taught AI and media literacy, provide free online suicide prevention training for all middle and high school students, staff, and parents, streamline the transfer process from community college to the CSU or UC system, ban the sale of new gas powered leaf blowers and lawnmowers, and prevent investor-owned utilities from charging customers for their political lobbying and promotional activities.
Marc chairs the Assembly Business and Professions Committee, which oversees health care professional licensing and regulation, occupational licensing and regulation, vocational education, and regulation of the legal cannabis industry. Marc also serves on the Assembly Elections, Insurance, and Governmental Organization committees. For his first five years in the Assembly Marc chaired the Elections Committee, where he was a leader on protecting and expanding voting rights, shielding voters from deceptive deepfakes in elections, making election information more accessible, and improving election cybersecurity and campaign finance disclosure. He also chairs the Select Committee on the Master Plan for Higher Education in California, which is conducting a methodical review of California’s higher education policies to make sure they meet the needs of current and future students.
Marc previously served on the Palo Alto City Council, where he was a leader on infrastructure improvement and financial transparency. While serving on the Palo Alto City Council, Marc worked for the Silicon Valley Education Foundation, a non-profit focused on increasing access to high quality STEM education and closing the achievement gap in Bay Area public schools.
Prior to his work in the non-profit sector, Marc was an attorney with Latham & Watkins LLP. Marc successfully represented pro bono clients seeking protection under the Violence Against Women Act and asylum in the United States due to political persecution in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He also served as pro bono counsel to Spark, a national youth development non-profit.
Marc was born in Dallas, Texas, and raised in Palo Alto. He earned a degree in Political Science from Georgetown University and went on to graduate from law school at the University of Southern California, where he was elected president of the Student Bar Association and served for two years on the Southern California Law Review.
Marc lives in Menlo Park with his wife Aimee Gildea, son Kaiden, and their puppy Maven.
