the 2006 finalist team. Law career (2007–2013) Upon graduating law school in 2007, Faleti worked as a litigation attorney at the St. Louis location of international law firm Bryan Cave (now Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner). In 2011, he became a state prosecutor in the St. Louis Circuit Attorney's Office and served for nearly three years. Nonprofit executive (2013–2019) In 2013, Faleti began serving as Senior Vice President of Philanthropic, Donor, and Community Services at the United Way of Greater St. Louis. In his tenure at United Way, he directed fundraising and volunteer efforts and raised more than $300 million for St. Louis. In 2018, he became the Executive Director of Forward Through Ferguson, a St. Louis-region nonprofit formed to implement changes proposed by the Ferguson Commission Report. After Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon appointed a coalition of regional leaders to form the Ferguson Commission. The Commission was to complete a “thorough, wide-ranging and unflinching study of the social and economic conditions that impede progress, equality and safety in the St. Louis region,” which culminated in the Ferguson Commission Report's release in 2015. Faleti was awarded the Immigrant Working Professional Award in the St. Louis Mosaic Project's 2018 Mosaic Workplace Awards for his work at Forward Through Ferguson. Missouri Secretary of State candidate (2019–2020) In October 2019, Faleti announced that he was running for Missouri Secretary of State in 2020 against the Republican incumbent Jay Ashcroft. The Missouri Democratic Party announced him as their nominee in April 2020. He stated that he is running for office "to increase opportunities to vote, reduce barriers to voter participation and protect and honor our ballot initiative process." If elected, he would have been the first African American to hold statewide office in Missouri. Faleti garnered significant statewide media attention when he fundraised more than 7 times the amount of his opponent, Republican incumbent Jay Ashcroft, in the second quarter of 2020. Aside from the election for governor, Faleti in this time period raised more than any candidate running for statewide office in Missouri. Faleti's endorsements included Let America Vote, St. Louis Post Dispatch, St. Louis American, Vote Vets, Missouri AFL-CIO and St. Louis Labor Council, End Citizens United, Access MO, Collective PAC, Indivisible St. Louis, Planned Parenthood Action Fund and NARAL Missouri. References 1976 births Living people African-American lawyers African-American United States Army personnel African-American people in Missouri politics American