Attorney General Cuccinelli
Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, II was elected Attorney General of Virginia and sworn into office on January 16, 2010. As attorney general, he is responsible for overseeing an office of over 425 employees.
Some of the key duties of the attorney general are:
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to serve as the attorney for the government of the Commonwealth and its agencies, providing them with legal advice and representation in court;
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to uphold and defend the United States and Virginia constitutions and to defend the constitutionality of Virginia laws when they are challenged in court;
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to clarify the law for his clients through official legal opinions;
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to prosecute sexual predators and gang members;
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to protect the elderly and the incapacitated from abuse and neglect;
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to conduct or assist in criminal investigations and prosecutions in certain cases, such as Medicaid fraud, money laundering, theft of state property, environmental crimes, and computer crimes;
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and to enforce state laws that protect businesses and consumers from scams and fraud.
Prior to serving as attorney general, he served in the Senate of Virginia from August 2002 to January 2010. 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. After joining the Senate in 2002, he passed legislation that provided for more humane treatment of the mentally ill.
He has also been a champion for Virginian’s property rights, sponsoring a law (and now backing a constitutional amendment) to dramatically curb the state’s eminent domain power, so private land can no longer be taken by government from one private owner and given to another, merely to increase tax revenues, economic development, or private gain.
He made government more transparent and accountable to its citizens by sponsoring a law to put the state’s detailed budget online in a format that citizens could easily understand.
As attorney general, Mr. Cuccinelli works to protect consumers from scams and fraud, take the worst sexually violent predators out of our communities, put gang members in jail, and save taxpayers millions each year by prosecuting Medicaid fraud in the Commonwealth.
Attorney General Cuccinelli earned a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Virginia, a master’s degree in International Commerce and Policy from George Mason University, and his juris doctor from the George Mason University School of Law and Economics.