Carol Elizabeth Moseley Braun, also sometimes Moseley-Braun[1] (born August 16, 1947), is an American diplomat, politician, and lawyer who represented Illinois in the United States Senate from 1993 to 1999.

Prior to her Senate tenure, Moseley Braun was a member of the Illinois House of Representatives from 1979 to 1988 and served as Cook County Recorder of Deeds from 1988 to 1992.

In November 2010, Moseley Braun began a campaign for mayor of Chicago to replace retiring incumbent Richard M. Daley.

In January 2023, she was nominated by President Joe Biden to serve as a member and chair of the board of directors for the United States African Development Foundation.

Her work in housing, health policy, and environmental law won her the Attorney General's Special Achievement Award.

[10] She stopped working as a prosecutor after her son's birth, and briefly became a homemaker before being persuaded to run for the Illinois state legislature.

[15] On November 3, 1992, Moseley Braun became the first African American woman to be elected to the United States Senate,[11] defeating Republican Richard S.

Like her Illinois colleague, fellow Democrat Paul Simon, she voted in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Moseley Braun also voted to place a nuclear spent fuel storage facility in Nevada; this move was strongly opposed by many Democrats, especially future Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Later that year, the rule was amended by Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Martha Pope to allow women to wear pants on the floor so long as they also wore jackets.

[25][26] In 1993, Moseley Braun made headlines when she convinced the Senate Judiciary Committee not to renew a design patent for the United Daughters of the Confederacy because it contained the Confederate flag.

[41] On February 18, 2003, she announced her intention to run for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, doing so in a speech delivered at the University of Chicago Law School.

[42][43][44][45] She had, in the days leading up to this announcement, made her first campaign-season visits to the early primary and caucus states of New Hampshire, Iowa, and South Carolina.

[47] When asked about her prospects of winning at the launch of her exploratory committee, Moseley Braun declared "I have every hope and every expectation that this will be a successful effort.

[52] She ran in general opposition to the measures implemented by the Bush administration in the aftermath of 9/11, arguing that their policies were exploiting Americans' fear after the attacks to put in place "an extreme agenda, dangerous and divisive" and to take away civil liberties.

She pledged to regain global goodwill for the United States and restore international cooperation that she argued had dissipated due to Bush's post-9/11 actions.

"[52] Moseley Braun argued that the United States should position itself as a leading force in achieving the environmental goals of the Kyoto Protocol, and should invest in environmental technologies with the goal of eliminating the United States' reliance on fossil fuels (including foreign oil).

[55] Moseley Braun's campaign would ultimately end up focusing their efforts on the African-American and female vote, which they regarded to be her base of support.

Rep. Danny Davis and State Sen. James Meeks—left the race and endorsed Moseley Braun, making her the so-called consensus black candidate.

[67] These discussions had occurred with the involvement of Chicago African American figures such Jesse Jackson and Walter Burnett Jr.[67][68][69] Moseley Braun appeared likely to be a strong contender for the mayoralty.

[67] African American politicians and community leaders also did not provide non-financial assistance to Moseley Brown's campaign effort.

[70] Her candidacy was also plagued by gaffes, including missed interviews and an inability to provide a sufficient explanation for her past financial problems.

[67] However, the most serious debacle came in a debate on January 30, 2011, when Moseley Braun accused another candidate, Patricia Van-Pelt Watkins, of "being strung out on crack" for 20 years.

Moseley Braun also criticized frontrunner Rahm Emanuel's tax proposals, arguing that they would fail to assist poorer Chicagoans.

She also accused Emanuel of having numerous times voted against Congressional Black Caucus proposals that would have assisted lower-income families.

[78] During the November 2019 Democratic presidential debate, Biden mentioned her endorsement, misspeaking and mistakenly referring to her as "the only African-American woman who's ever been elected to the United States Senate", only to be quickly corrected by his opponents, including Kamala Harris, who herself happened to be the second (and, at the time, only other) African-American woman elected to the U.S. Senate.

[83][84] After Biden's victory in the general election (with Kamala Harris as his vice presidential running mate), Moseley Braun made it publicly known that she was interested in being his Secretary of the Interior.

[87] In January 2023, Biden nominated Moseley Braun to be member and chair of the board of directors of the United States African Development Foundation.

[11] Trailblazer: Perseverance in Life and Politics, a memoir authored by Moseley Braun, is scheduled to be published on January 21, 2026, by Hanover Square Press.

[96] In April 2007, Braun suffered a broken wrist when a mugger emerged from bushes near her front door to steal her purse.