About Ken

Meet Ken

Ken Cuccinelli was sworn in as Virginia’s Attorney General on January 16, 2010.

As Attorney General, he has become best known for his efforts to preserve liberty and defend the US Constitution.

Prior to assuming this role, he was a leading conservative member of the Virginia Senate from 2002 until 2010. His experience as a small business owner and an attorney had uniquely prepared him for his role in the General Assembly where he served on the Courts of Justice Committee, Transportation Committee, Local Government Committee, Rehabilitation and Social Services Committee, and the Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources Committee.

As a state senator, Ken led the fight to defend constitutional rights, stop tax increases, protect life and families, and keep Virginia a low-regulation and pro-free market state.

From 2005 up to the present day, Ken has worked tirelessly to pass meaningful eminent domain laws that now prevent local and state governments from taking private homes and businesses for developers’ projects instead of for true public uses. Ken also had a strong record of supporting our police officers as they protect our communities. He passed legislation that stopped local governments from unfairly exploiting our law enforcement officers’ overtime work.

Prior to assuming the office of Attorney General, Ken was a small business owner and partner in the law firm of Cuccinelli & Day, in Fairfax. He was a business law attorney with a particular focus on serving as an outsourced general counsel to small and mid-sized companies. His wide range of experience included litigation, licensing, financing, employment, advertising, branding, corporate formation, business transactions and contracts for both domestic and international clients. Ken also had experience in public interest, constitutional law and property rights cases.

Family

Ken’s wife, Teiro, was almost the girl next door. Actually, she lived three doors down from his family’s Northern Virginia home. Ken and Teiro married in 1991, after Ken graduated from the Engineering School at The University of Virginia and Teiro graduated from James Madison University with a Business Degree. After over 20 years of marriage, they have been blessed with five daughters and two sons.

Ken and Teiro are active members of Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Gainesville.

GONZAGA PREP

  • Cuccinelli’s Experience At Gonzaga Prep School Is How He Became Involved In Social Justice.  “I actually consciously thought about, Where am I? Where do I want to be? How do I want to get there? What are the important things?” he says. “Faith was at the top, and at Gonzaga you’d expect that. But what does that mean in the real world? And we’d talk about it at Gonzaga.” Every student took a course in social justice, where he was taught theories of putting compassion into action. Cuccinelli tutored middle school students from the D.C. public schools.  (David Montgomery, The Rise Of The Confounding Conservative, Washington Post, 8/1/10)

UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

  • While At The University Of Virginia, Cuccinelli Helped Establish The Sexual Assault Fact and Education Group.  “He transformed himself into a self-taught campus expert and agitator on the problem of sexual assault. He helped establish Sexual Assault Facts and Education (SAFE), a student group that raises awareness about the issue, and designed a brochure on preventing sexual assault. Survivors confided in him. It was emotionally scalding work.”  (David Montgomery, The Rise Of The Confounding Conservative, Washington Post, 8/1/10) 
  • Cuccinelli Helped Organize A Vigil For Sexual Assault Victims On UVA’s Campus.  Helped Established The Sexual Assault Fact and Education Group.  By April 1991, he was standing with a candle in his hand on the steps of the university’s Rotunda, the historic center of the genteel campus designed by Thomas Jefferson. Cuccinelli was an organizer of dozens of student protesters who occupied the steps for 134 hours — one for each of the 134 alleged victims of sexual assault at the university the previous year — and demanded that the university fund the new full-time position of sexual assault education coordinator.  (David Montgomery, The Rise Of The Confounding Conservative, Washington Post, 8/1/10)
  • Because Of Cuccinelli, UVA Hired A Full-Time Sexual Assault Coordinator.  Just hours into the vigil, the university proposed hiring a part-time coordinator. The vigil continued for the full 134 hours. Before the year was out, a full-time coordinator was hired.  Victory.  (David Montgomery, The Rise Of The Confounding Conservative, Washington Post, 8/1/10)

 CUCCINELLI ON MENTAL HEALTH

  • Cuccinelli Has Worked Hard Both In The Public And Private Sector To Improve Virginia’s Mental Health System.  As a state senator and private attorney, he worked to improve the Commonwealth’s mental health system.  In private practice, he served as a court-appointed attorney for individuals in Virginia’s involuntary civil commitment process.  (Ken Cuccinelli, Office Of The Attornery General, Accessed 2/19/13)
  • Cuccinelli Donated $100,000 To A Richmond-Based Mental Health Services Organization.  Cuccinelli donates to Daily Planet.  Attorney General-elect Ken Cuccinelli yesterday pledged $100,000 from his inauguration fundraising effort to the Daily Planet, a Richmond-based nonprofit organization that provides medical and mental-health services Cuccinelli to the homeless.  Cuccinelli announced the pledge at Daily Planet headquarters on Grace Street in Richmond to raise awareness of mental-health issues and promote efforts to revamp some mental-health laws that he says make the system more costly, difficult to navigate and less effective at treating the mentally disabled.  (Jim Nolan, Cuccinelli donates to Daily Planet, Richmond Times-Dispatch, 01/13/10)

CUCCINELLI ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING

  • As Attorney General, Cuccinelli Has Fought Against Human Trafficking.  Va. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli met with members of the General Assembly Tuesday in a bipartisan effort to promote new legislation to fight human trafficking.  The meeting also served as an introduction to a series of two-day-long human trafficking training conferences – which begin Wednesday in Northern Virginia – for law enforcement and prosecutors in all regions of the commonwealth over the next six months.  “Human trafficking is one of the fastest growing criminal enterprises in the country,” Cuccinelli in a press release.  (Cuccinelli Makes Human Trafficking Virginia’s Top Priority in 2013, CBS-TV Washington, 01/15/13)
  • Cuccinelli Has Spent Several Years Fighting The War Against Human Trafficking.  He’s been pursuing these crimes for several years, dating back to when he introduced anti-trafficking legislation and served on the Human Trafficking Commission as a senator, which is when he first developed a plan for trafficking prevention in Virginia. He’s implemented that plan at every level of office he’s held since.  (Cuccinelli Makes Human Trafficking Virginia’s Top Priority in 2013, CBS-TV Washington, 01/15/13)
    • 2006: General Assembly session: Senator Cuccinelli introduced SB291 to establish the Human Anti-Trafficking Act.
    • 2007: General Assembly session: Senator Cuccinelli introduced SB815, stipulating that any person who destroys, removes, confiscates or possesses a passport, immigration document, or other government identification document in exchange for money or property would be guilty of a Class 5 felony.
    • 2007-2008: Senator Cuccinelli was appointed to the Human Trafficking Commission, which worked to develop and implement a plan for the prevention of human trafficking in the State of Virginia.
    • 2009: Senator Cuccinelli supported Delegate Adam Ebbin’s bill (HB2016) to expand the definition of abduction to include a person with the intent to subject another into forced labor or services.

CUCCINELLI ON THE WRIT OF INNOCENCE

  • As Attorney General, Cuccinelli Has Fought Hard For Those Who Have Been Wrongly Convicted And Was Instrumental In Thomas Haynesworth’s Case. In December, Virginia’s Court of Appeals declared Haynesworth an innocent man, clearing his name and acknowledging that he spent 27 years behind bars for crimes he did not commit.  Haynesworth, was supported by Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II (R) and a pair of state prosecutors — all of whom concluded that he was mistakenly identified by a rape victim as he walked to a Richmond market for sweet potatoes and bread one February afternoon in 1984.  Using technology that wasn’t available in the 1980s, authorities tested semen collected in a January 1984 rape for which Haynesworth had been convicted. It cleared him and pointed to a convicted rapist named Leon Davis.  “Although we wish that the amount of money could have been greater, we also know that no amount can make up for those 27 lost years,’’ Cuccinelli said. “We pray that this will allow Thomas a new beginning to pursue the dreams he has been waiting almost three decades to fulfill.”  (McDonnell signs bill giving Thomas Haynesworth $1M, Washington Post, 4/6/12)