Elie Mystal Biography
Elie Mystal is an American attorney, author and political commentator. He is a justice correspondent and columnist for The Nation where he covers the courts, the criminal justice system, and politics. He is also the legal editor of the More Perfect podcast on the Supreme Court for Radiolab and a part-time MSNBC legal commentator.
He is a former litigator at a big law firm but he quit to pursue a career as an online provocateur. He wrote about politics and popular culture at City Hall News in New York Press. In 2008, he won the Above the Law Idol Contest which helped him join Above the Law.
Elie writes in his book “Allow Me to Retort: A Black Guy’s Guide to the Constitution,” that the U.S. Constitution is not only “not good,” but that it’s “actually trash” but the Supreme Court can be fixed. He alleges that the constitution was drafted by men who owned slaves and enshrined that evil institution with the infamous Fugitive Slave Clause and the “three-fifths compromise.” He notes that the constitution is given too much deference: “We act like this thing was kind of etched in stone by the finger of God, when actually it was hotly contested and debated, scrawled out over a couple of weeks in the summer in Philadelphia in 1787, with a bunch of rich, white politicians making deals with each other.”
Elie Mystal Age and Height
Elie was born on May 10, 1978 in Haiti and stands at a height of 5 feet 7 inches tall.
Elie Mystal Education
He attended Harvard University for his undergraduate studies graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science and Government. He later joined Harvard Law School where he received his Juris Doctor in 2003.
Elie Mystal Ethnicity
He is of Asian-American descent. He once tweeted that his grandfather was Chinese who married a black school teacher in Mississippi. His full legal name is Eli Ying Mystal.
Elie Mystal Parents
Elie is the son of Elie Mystal Sr. and Elizabeth Ying. The couple met in college and after college they moved to New York where Mystal started a political newspaper in Harlem called “Big Red,” which he ran for about five years. In the early 1980s the family moved to Amityville, where Mystal became involved in local politics working on campaigns and began working for Postal in 1987. The couple divorced in 1994.
Elie Mystal Father
Elli’s father, Elie Mystal Sr. was the first elected African-American Suffolk Legislature and a key political operative who helped Democrats gain a legislative majority with his skill in crafting campaigns and legislative districts
He died on November 22, 2017 at the age of 71 due to pneumonia after battling lymphoma for 1 1⁄2-year which left him hospitalized severally.
During his career, he served as an aide to Legis. Maxine Postal (D-Amityville) for 18 years and later her chief of staff when she became the legislature’s presiding officer. He succeeded Postal in 2004 as the legislator in the 15th District, shortly after she died of a rare brain disorder.
His tenure as a lawmaker ended in 2008 after he faced charges that he lied about living in the district in 2007 and 2008, a period during which he was splitting his time between Huntington Station, which was outside the district, and Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. He was sentenced to five years of probation and was ordered to pay $84,300 in restitution.
He was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti but they immigrated to New York City when Mystal was 17, and he was offered a soccer scholarship to the University of Denver while playing in Central Park. He later stopped playing after suffering a head injury when he collided with another player as both went for the ball.
Elie Mystal Mother
Mystal’s mother, Elizabeth Ying was born in 1950 in Mississippi. She is a speech-language pathologist with over 40-year experience of providing aural habilitation and rehabilitation services to children and adults with varying degrees of hearing loss. She is the co-director at Shelley and Steven Einhorn Audiology and Communication Center; at the Center for Hearing and Communication.
She began her career as a member of CHC’s clinical staff where she began her pioneering work in auditory-based oral speech and language therapy for recipients of cochlear implants. She later served as clinical supervisor of the DeVault Otologic Research Laboratory at Indiana School of Medicine, gathering data for NIH-funded research investigations of the benefits of cochlear implantation within the pediatric population.
Who is Elie Mystal Wife?
Ellie married his wife Christine Nyereyegona in August 2004. The couple met while they were studying at Harvard University. Christine is a corporate attorney focused on practice at the intersection of business and law. She is an expert in fixed income and equity structured product mechanics and markets.
Christine received her J.D. from Harvard Law School and was admitted to the New York State bar in 2004. She is the Vice President & Assistant General Counsel at JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Elie Mystal Children
Mystal and his wife Christine have two children together.
Elie Mystal The Nation
Ellie is a legal analyst and justice correspondent for The Nation where he covers the courts, the criminal justice system, and politics. He is also a columnist for the magazine’s monthly column ‘Objection’. He is a former executive editor of Above the Law,.
He began his career as a commercial litigation associate at Debevoise & Plimpton. He later left the job and landed a writing job at New York Press. In 2008 he joined Above the Law as an associate after winning ‘Above the Law Idol Contest’, he was later promoted to executive editor.
In addition, he has also written editorials for The New York Times and the Daily News. He has also appeared as a legal commentator on CNN, FOX News, MSNBC among other broadcast media.
Elie Mystal Podcast
Elie is the legal editor of the More Perfect podcast on the Supreme Court for Radiolab.
Elie Mystal Book
Elie is the author of Allow Me to Retort: A Black Guy’s Guide to the Constitution. The books talks about how the Republicans are wrong about the law almost all of the time. In the book, he explains how to protect the rights of women and people of color and explains the legal way to stop everything from police brutality to political gerrymandering, just by changing a few judges and justices.
Elie Mystal Net worth
He has an estimated net worth of $5 million.