A Life of Service 

Culver City Mayor Daniel Lee became the first 

African-American member of the Culver City Council 

in its over 100-year history in 2018. A veteran of the 

U.S. Air Force and the California Air National Guard, 

he currently works as Project Director at the James 

Lawson Institute. Daniel has a Master’s Degree in 

Social Welfare from the University of California, Los 

Angeles (UCLA) and a Doctorate in Social Work from 

the University of Southern California (USC). He 

currently serves on the Board of Directors for Move 

to Amend, the Backbone Campaign, Mockingbird 

Incubator, and the Clean Power Alliance. 

Born in Opelika, Alabama and raised in Pensacola, 

Florida (with frequent trips back home to visit family 

in and around Tuskegee, Alabama) Daniel credits his 

grandmother, who participated with Dr. Martin Luther King in the Montgomery bus boycott, for his desire to be of service and for his own social justice perspective. 

Much of Dr. Lee’s local effort has been with youth. A filmmaker and actor, he has volunteered with El Rincon Elementary School students in the arts and communication program for the past 17 years. He also developed a Civil Rights curriculum that he implemented at the Teen Center to increase young people’s understanding of their country’s history. He also served on the Culver City Martin Luther King Celebration Committee for 7 years, planning its citywide celebration of the iconic Civil Rights leader. 

Union Involvement & Support 

In the 2016 election cycle, Dr. Lee worked as a campaign lead for the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL CIO. Prior to that he was a member of the SAG-AFTRA for over a decade and has demonstrated repeatedly over the last few decades with grocery workers, writers, and port workers advocating for higher wages. Daniel understands that as union wages and benefits rise there is a positive impact on the wages of all workers. For the past 4 years, Dr. Lee has worked closely with Rev. James Lawson who has served as a mentor and co-organizer for unions throughout Southern California. 

PAID FOR BY DANIEL LEE FOR CONGRESS 5445 Madison Avenue, Sacramento, CA 95841 https://danielwaynelee.com/

Veteran | Social Worker | Community Organizer | Filmmaker 

Most recently during this pandemic, Dr. Lee worked with SEIU UHW organizers to pass hero pay for grocery and hospital workers at Southern California Hospital in Culver City. Dr. Lee along with his city council colleagues were able to enact “Hero Pay” for these essential workers in Culver City. Helping our local workers by raising their wages, and demonstrating how we should value workers, their hard work, and the risk they are subjected to in order to provide services and essential work in our communities. 

In addition, Dr. Lee’s mother is a retired union nurse who resides in Florida and is an advocate for single-payer healthcare. His entire reason to be involved in politics, and serve as an elected official, has been to be a passionate and active advocate for workers inside and outside of unions. 

City Council Work Experience 

As a Council Member, Dr. Lee has championed mental health, police accountability and very notably worked to close the Inglewood Oil Field. He has worked on this effort prior to his election with the Sierra Club’s Clean Break Subcommittee and continued that work as an elected official. As a passionate environmental advocate, Dr. Lee will work to accelerate the sorely needed “Just Transition” away from Fossil Fuels using innovative strategies that don’t leave workers in the lurch and provide for good union jobs. 

Dr. Lee also worked to help Culver City pass, and recently successfully defend, its rent control policy. At the federal level, Daniel will work for increased renter protections, the repeal of Costa Hawkins, and the acceleration of housing production in a manner that incorporates community concerns around affordability, gentrification, and displacement. 

With Dr. Lee’s leadership, Culver City is also implementing a Mobile Crisis Intervention Service (MCIS) program to respond to calls for individuals experiencing issues related to mental health, drug use, being unhoused, or other well-being concerns. This program crystalizes alternatives to interaction with police when there are better qualified and trained professionals to address certain community concerns and issues. 

Along with residents, Mayor Lee helped Culver City pass a resolution on Reparations committing to programs to atone for the City’s racist past as a sun-down town through a system of reparations designed to narrow the racial and housing gap in the City. 

Dr. Daniel Lee’s experience and accomplishments on the Culver City Council show him to be a leader of substance and courage, so desperately needed in Congress.

For many we are one.