Tim Kaine is an American politician serving as the junior United States Senator from Virginia since January 2013. Elected to the Senate in 2012, he is the nominee of the Democratic Party for Vice President of the United States in the 2016 election. A lawyer by profession, he graduated from the University of Missouri, and earned a law degree from Harvard Law School. The son of an ironworker and a home economics teacher, he was not raised in a political household but grew interested in politics as a young man. While studying law the staunch Catholic worked with Jesuit missionaries in Honduras and witnessed the devastating effects of poverty. This ignited in him a commitment to social justice, a value that would be reflected in his future career. He ventured into a successful legal career and devoted much of his time to pro-bono work, often representing people who had been denied housing opportunities because of their race or disability. His political career began in the 1990s when he was elected to the Richmond City Council. He rose to higher political ranks over the ensuing years and was elected governor of Virginia in 2005. He proceeded to serve as the chairman of the Democratic National Committee before being elected to the Senate.