Portal:Georgia (U.S. state)/Selected biography/13

Mohammed Kasim Reed, known as Kasim Reed, (born June 10, 1969) is a Democratic politician and the 59th Mayor of Atlanta, who previously represented the 35th District of the Georgia State Senate. He was a member of the Georgia House of Representatives from 1998 to 2002. After serving as campaign manager for Shirley Franklin's successful 2001 Atlanta Mayoral campaign, he ran for the position in 2009 since Franklin was term limited. He was one of two candidates to advance from the November 3 general election to a December 1, 2009 runoff election, which he won and was officially inaugurated as Mayor of Atlanta on January 4, 2010. In college, he instituted a student fee that has added millions of dollars to the Howard University endowment since its inception in 1991. In 2003, he was involved with the effort to prevent the Georgia State Senate from considering reinserting the battle emblem of the Confederate States of America in the official State Flag of Georgia.