Born in Nashville, Tennessee,[4] Levine earned an economics degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard University and was a Fulbright scholar in Switzerland.

Levine worked as a Nazi hunter, Jewish historian, and inner-city schoolteacher before becoming a trial attorney at Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP in Los Angeles.

"[12] In 1994, Levine helped organize a march on Hollywood and met personally with high-ranking studio executives to demand they depict gay and lesbian characters in a positive light.

This modest attempt on February 14, 2000 to marry at a Beverly Hills courthouse became the first of the "Valentine's Day Marriage Protests" that would later sweep the country.

And court officials, in turn, graciously agreed to waive the marriage license fee, since we all knew they would reject our attempts to get married.

"[6] Michael Moore has called Levine's explanation of the Bush v. Gore opinion[19] a "Simple Q&A that Every American Should Read" and "the best thing he's seen" on the issue.

At the joint session of Congress, when it came time to count Florida's electoral votes, the Congressional Black Caucus presented the legal challenge Levine had drafted.

[6][21] In January 2001, Levine moved from California to Alexandria, Virginia to serve three years as chief legislative counsel to Barney Frank, a high-ranking Democrat on the Judiciary, Homeland Security, and Financial Services Committees.

In that capacity Levine says he learned how Washington really works: from the way bills become law to political negotiations, spin, administration secrets, and dangerous lapses in American security.

[5] While working for Frank, Levine used bipartisan back channels to ensure that LGBT 9/11 survivors were treated equally in distributions from the victims compensation fund.

He also personally persuaded Hillary Clinton to withdraw her endorsement from President Bush's faith-based initiative, which would have allowed the federal government to discriminate on the basis of religion.

Levine also has served as an investigative journalist, doing stories uncovering spies at the FBI and spreading the word in 2006 about the national government monitoring the telephone calls of the vast majority of ordinary American citizens.

On February 18, 2014, Levine became one of ten candidates entering the June 10, 2014 Democratic primary to succeed retiring representative Jim Moran.

"[30] In that primary campaign, Levine garnered the endorsement of Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe and 36 other state and local officials.

[31] On November 7, 2017, facing no opposition in the general election, Levine won re-election to represent Virginia's 45th District in the House of Delegates with more than 95% of the vote.