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Penn Law alumnus wins congressional seat in Pennsylvania

March 15, 2018

Conor Lamb C'06, L'09 served in the Marines and is a former Assistant U.S. Attorney.
Conor Lamb C'06, L'09 served in the Marines and is a former Assistant U.S. Attorney.
Conor Lamb C’06, L’09 has won the special election for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 18th District on March 13. Lamb, a Democrat, defeated Republican state representative Rick Saccone.

Conor Lamb C’06, L’09 has won the special election for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 18th District on March 13. Lamb, a Democrat, defeated Republican state representative Rick Saccone.

Lamb, a former Marine Corps officer and federal prosecutor, won in a district that voted heavily for President Donald Trump in the 2016 election.

Lamb grew up in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny County, and after graduating from Penn in 2006 with a BA in political science, he earned his JD from Penn Law in 2009.

Following law school, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps, where he served on active duty until 2013. After completing his active duty service with the rank of Captain, he clerked for Judge Joseph Frank Bianco of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, then was appointed an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Western District of Pennsylvania.

In the U.S. Attorney’s office, he prosecuted criminal cases involving drugs, particularly those related to the heroin epidemic.

Pennsylvania’s 18th District currently covers the southwestern portion of the state, but a new congressional map was released by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for the November 2018 election after they ruled that the previous map was partisan gerrymandered. The new map features changes to the districts in the southwestern region of Pennsylvania, including the 18th District.