The future is the theme of the final night of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, when Vice President Kamala Harris will accept her party’s nomination for president.

The party is hoping that Shomari Figures, an Alabama Democrat who has a coveted speaking slot on Thursday, is part of that future.

Figures, a 39-year-old former Obama and Biden administration official who comes from a politically active Mobile family, could be the second Black person and second Democrat in Alabama’s seven-member U.S. House delegation.

An opportunity opened this year for Democrats in Alabama when a federal court redrew the Republican-leaning 2nd Congressional District to favor Democrats. The court ruled Alabama’s congressional map most likely violated the Voting Rights Act by packing Black voters into a single district majority Black district, District 7.

Figures, who resigned as deputy chief of staff and counselor to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to run for the new congressional seat, was the leading vote-getter in the crowded 11-candidate field in the Democratic primary.

He then defeated Alabama House Minority Leader Anthony Daniels, R-Huntsville, in the Democratic runoff to become the party’s nominee in November, where he will face Republican Montgomery attorney Caroleene Dobson.

His work in the Biden administration is not Figures’ only stint in government.

In the Obama administration, Figures served as domestic director of presidential personnel.

‘In the White House, I worked to build the teams at agencies critical to implementing President Obama’s policies,” Figures says in his bio on his campaign website.

“I worked closely with senior leadership at agencies that touch the daily lives of people in Alabama, including the Departments of Education, Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and Justice. I was proud to be able to support, from the ground up, the implementation of policies and legislation like the Affordable Care Act, which has improved the lives of thousands in Alabama.”

Figures is the son of Michael Figures, the late Alabama state senator who served 18 years before his sudden death in 1996, when Shomari Figures was 11.

Vivian Figures, Shomari Figures’ mother who served on the Mobile City Council at the time of Michael Figures’ death, replaced her husband in the Senate, where she continues to represent Mobile in Montgomery. She is also a convention delegate.

“This moment is not possible without my mother,” Shomari Figures told AL.com shortly after his convention speaking slot was announced. “It’s not possible without what she has done, not just in picking up that torch politically, but in raising me and raising my brothers and being the example of public service in our community and in our state.

“I’m happier for her than I am for me because she certainly produced the guy that will take the stage on Thursday night.”

He said his speech on Thursday will focus on the district’s civil rights legacy.

“I don’t know when the last time we’ve had anybody from this district, Mobile, Montgomery, what is now this district, if ever, speaking at the national convention,” Figures said.

“And so, this is not me that’s going up there. This is the legacies of everything that has come through this district. We’re talking from the Tuskegee Airmen, to John Lewis, to Rosa Parks, to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, to Fred Gray. This is about so much more than just me.

“So when we take that stage, I will certainly be taking it with all 13 counties that are in this district. And I will certainly be standing on the shoulders of the giants that helped create the greatest movement and the greatest social movement that the world has ever seen. That ultimately is the reason we got this district in the first place.”