Before Rob Bonta became California's first Filipino-American attorney general in 2021, his family lived in a trailer at a farmworkers' headquarters.
His parents weren't just telling him to help people. His father helped set up health clinics, while his mother worked in the preschool.
A CHILDHOOD AROUND ORGANIZERS
Rob was born in Quezon City and came to California as an infant. His mother, Cynthia, was Filipina; his father, Warren, had grown up in California.
At La Paz, the United Farm Workers headquarters near Bakersfield, the family lived among people organizing for farmworkers' rights. Rob later recalled his father working with Cesar Chavez and his mother with Dolores Huerta.
The family eventually settled in Fair Oaks, near Sacramento. Rob went to public school and graduated as valedictorian of Bella Vista High. Our residence in Fair Oaks ( 2002 to 2023) was a two-minute walk to Bella Vista High School. This is the first time I learned that Bonta's Family and I were former neighbors. A small world indeed!
SOCCER, SCHOOL AND A FAMILY OF HIS OWN
He went east to Yale, where he played soccer and graduated with honors in history. A year of study at Oxford followed, then Yale Law School, where he earned his law degree in 1998.
Yale also became part of his family story. He and Mia met as first-year college students and married in 1997; they would become parents to three children.
His legal career began with a federal judicial clerkship and work at the San Francisco firm Keker & Van Nest. There, he was part of a team working without charging fees on an ACLU case challenging racial profiling by the California Highway Patrol.
FROM REPRESENTING A CITY TO WRITING LAWS
Rob spent nine years as a deputy city attorney in San Francisco, representing the city and its workers. In 2010, he won a seat on the Alameda City Council.
He later told law students that he'd watched elected officials decline to stand with his parents on issues they cared about. He wanted to be an official who listened and responded.
In 2012, voters sent him to the State Assembly, making him the first Filipino American elected to California's Legislature. His district included Oakland, Alameda and San Leandro.
The move changed what he could do with the law. Instead of only working within existing rules, he could help write new ones.
Over more than eight years in the Assembly, his work included legislation on renters' protections and for-profit prisons.
THE FIRST, AND THE JOB AFTER IT
When Attorney General Xavier Becerra left to become U.S. health secretary, Governor Gavin Newsom chose Rob as his replacement. He was sworn in on April 23, 2021, as California's 34th attorney general and its first of Filipino descent.
Voters then elected him to a four-year term in November 2022.
But leading the state's justice department also meant dealing with laws he personally disagreed with. During a 2023 visit with law students, he discussed the difficulty of enforcing laws such as the death penalty, which he opposes.
As of October 2026, Rob remains California's attorney general, leading the department whose work includes criminal investigations and representing the state in court.
Source: California Department of Justice; California Governor, 2021; Berkeley Law, 2023; 48 Hills, 2021; Public Policy Institute of California; Climate One, 2024.
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