David Tyson Smith is an American attorney and politician serving as a member of the

Missouri House of Representatives The Missouri House of Representatives is the lower chamber of the Missouri General Assembly. It has 163 members, representing districts with an average size of 37,000 residents. House members are elected for two-year terms during general elections ...

from the 46th District. He assumed office after a special election in April 2021 for district 45. Then after redistricting in 2022, his home placed in district 46.

Early life and education

Smith was born and raised in

Columbia, Missouri Columbia is a city in Missouri, United States. It was founded in 1821 as the county seat of Boone County, Missouri, Boone County and had a population of 126,254 as recorded in the 2020 United States census, making it the List of cities in Misso ...

. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration from the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri, United States. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Univers ...

and a

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

from the

Tulane University Law School The Tulane University School of Law is the law school of Tulane University. It is located on Tulane's Uptown campus in New Orleans, Louisiana. Established in 1847, it is the 12th oldest law school in the United States. Campus The law schoo ...

Career

Smith worked as an attorney in

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

before returning to Columbia, where he founded Smith and Parnell LLC. In 2021, Smith was selected by the Boone County Democratic Committee to succeed Kip Kendrick in the

. Smith later competed in a special election to fill the remainder of Kendrick's term. He became the first Black state representative for Columbia, as well as the first outside of

St. Louis St. Louis ( , sometimes referred to as St. Louis City, Saint Louis or STL) is an independent city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It lies near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a populatio ...

and

Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more t ...

Electoral history

References

Living people Democratic Party members of the Missouri House of Representatives African-American state legislators in Missouri 21st-century African-American politicians Missouri lawyers People from Columbia, Missouri University of Missouri alumni Tulane University Law School alumni Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century members of the Missouri General Assembly {{Missouri-MORepresentative-stub