Edwin M. Lee

His parents immigrated to the United States from Taishan, Guangdong, China, in the 1930s.

Lee's father, Gok Suey Lee, fought in the Korean War, worked as a cook, and managed a restaurant in Seattle.

He died when Lee was 15.

His mother was a seamstress and waitress.

Lee had five siblings.

Edwin Mah Lee (May 5, 1952 – December 12, 2017) was an American politician and attorney who served as the 43rd Mayor of San Francisco from 2011 until his death in 2017.

Born in Seattle to Chinese American parents, Lee was a member of the Democratic Party.

Lee was born in 1952 in the Beacon Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington.

He attended Franklin High School, before graduating summa cum laude from Bowdoin College in Maine in 1974, completed a year overseas as a Watson Fellow, and then graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law in 1978.

After Lee completed law school and received his Juris Doctor degree from UC Berkeley School of Law, he worked as managing attorney for the San Francisco Asian Law Caucus, where he was an advocate for affordable housing and the rights of immigrants and renters.

In 1989, Mayor Art Agnos appointed Lee to be the city's first investigator under the city's whistleblower ordinance.

Agnos later appointed him deputy director of Human Relations.

In 1991, he was hired as executive director of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, serving in that capacity under Mayors Agnos, Frank Jordan, and Willie Brown.

Brown appointed him director of city purchasing, where, among other responsibilities, he ran the city's first Minority/Women-Owned Business Enterprise program.

In 2000, he was appointed director of public works for the city, and in 2005 was appointed by Mayor Newsom to a five-year term as city administrator, to which he was reappointed in 2010.

As city administrator, Lee oversaw the reduction of city government and implemented the city's first ever ten-year capital plan.

In 2010 a vacancy in the office of mayor was impending when incumbent Gavin Newsom was elected as Lieutenant Governor of California.

Under the San Francisco City Charter, vacancies in the mayoral office are filled by a majority vote of the Board of Supervisors, in which each supervisor is barred from voting for themselves.

Speculation about possible appointees and debate on whether or not the old board of supervisors should cast the vote for the new mayor soon followed Newsom's election as lieutenant governor.

(Four old supervisors were term-limited and four new people were elected in the 2010 election to take their place.)

The board of supervisors nominated four people—former mayor Art Agnos, Sheriff Michael Hennessey, former board of supervisors president Aaron Peskin, and Lee.

He took office as San Francisco city administrator in 2005 and was appointed on January 11, 2011, by the Board of Supervisors to serve out the remaining term of former mayor Gavin Newsom after Newsom resigned to become Lieutenant Governor of California.

On November 8, 2011, he won the election to serve a full term as mayor.

None of them captured the necessary six votes at a meeting of the board on January 4, 2011, but after debate, some supervisors expressed willingness to switch their support to Lee, and the meeting was recessed until January 7.

At the January 7 meeting, the old board voted 10–1 to elect Lee as mayor, with outgoing Supervisor Chris Daly casting the lone "no" vote.

At the time, Lee promised not to seek election if appointed, a statement that helped to gain support for his appointment.

The board included people who aimed to run in the November 2011 mayoral elections, none of whom wished to give the mayoral position to someone who might be their competitor in those elections, which would give that person the significant political advantages of incumbency.

The vote was preliminary and non-binding, as Newsom had delayed his resignation until new members of the board took office.

A final vote was taken on January 11 by the new board to confirm Lee, one day after Newsom's resignation.

The board voted unanimously for Lee and he took office immediately thereafter.

However, some San Francisco political activists – including Rose Pak, consultant for the San Francisco Chinese Chamber of Commerce, Planning Commission President Christina Olague, Assistant District Attorney Victor Hwang, 'Progress for All' chief consultant, Enrique Pearce and Eddy Zheng – started a "Run Ed Run" campaign in June 2011 to encourage him to put his name on the ballot.

By July 28, Lee stated that he had visited his daughters in Washington state and discussed with them the possibility of running, but had still not made up his mind.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, herself a former appointee mayor who had gone on to win reelection for two terms, publicly supported a Lee candidacy.

The San Francisco Chronicle wrote that unnamed city officials close to Lee told the media that Lee had "nearly finalized his decision" to run.

On August 7, 2011, Lee reneged on his promise to the San Francisco board of supervisors and formally announced his decision to seek election.

He stated that the atmosphere of political cooperation during his months in office had inspired him to run.

Lee won the November 2011 election, with John Avalos finishing second.

Lee's term expired in January 2012, when the winner of the November 2011 mayoral election would assume office.

Lee originally pledged not to run in that election.

He was reelected in 2015.