Antonio Delgado

Antonio Ramon Delgado (born January 28, 1977) is an American attorney and politician from the state of New York. A Democrat, he is the member of the United States House of Representatives from New York's 19th congressional district. The district includes most of the southern and eastern suburbs of the Capital District, as well as the outer portion of the lower Hudson Valley. He is the first person of either African-American or Hispanic descent to be elected to Congress from Upstate New York.

Delgado was born in 1977, in Schenectady, New York, to Tony Delgado and Thelma P. Hill. He is of African-American and Puerto Rican ancestry.He attended Notre Dame-Bishop Gibbons High School and played for the school's basketball team. He enrolled at Colgate University and played college basketball for the Colgate Raiders men's basketball team alongside future Golden State Warriors player Adonal Foyle. He played in the 1996 NCAA Division I Tournament in Indianapolis. Delgado graduated from Colgate in 1999, and earned a Rhodes Scholarship to study at The Queen's College, Oxford in 2001. He later graduated from Harvard Law School.

After law school, Delgado moved to Los Angeles in 2005 and worked in the music industry. In 2007, Delgado released a socially conscious rap album under the stage name "AD the Voice". He then worked as a litigator in the New York office of the law firm Akin Gump.

In the 2018 elections, Delgado ran for the United States House of Representatives in New York's 19th congressional district.

He defeated six other candidates in the Democratic Party's primary election, and faced incumbent Republican John Faso in the November 6 general election.

During Delgado's campaign, he criticized Faso for his votes against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Faso, alongside the Congressional Leadership Fund and the National Republican Congressional Committee, launched attacks on Delgado's former rap career, alleging that his lyrics were offensive, misogynistic, and profane. They commonly referred to Delgado as a "big city rapper." The New York Times Editorial Board condemned the attacks as "race-baiting."

On November 6, Delgado was elected, receiving 132,001 votes versus Faso's 124,408, out of 267,979 total votes cast. Delgado was sworn into office on January 3, 2019.

Committee assignments

• Committee on Agriculture
  • Subcommittee on Biotechnology, Horticulture, and Research
  • Subcommittee on Commodity Exchanges, Energy, and Credit
• Committee on Small Business
  • Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Tax and Capital Access
• Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
  • Subcommittee on Highways and Transit
  • Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment

Caucus memberships

• Congressional Black Caucus
• LGBT Equality Caucus

Delgado married Lacey Schwartz in 2011. Schwartz made Little White Lie, a documentary film for PBS in 2015, examining being biracial. They have twin children and live in Rhinebeck, Dutchess County. He is 6 ft 4 in.