Meet Charles R. Lowery Jr.: 2022 D.C. Bar President-Elect Candidate
March 16, 2022
The D.C. Bar’s 2022 general and Communities elections will run from April 28 to June 1. Eligible voters will receive an email link to their ballots via Survey & Ballot Systems, an independent vendor administering the elections. Voting will be held exclusively online. View the full slate of candidates.
Here, get to know Charles R. Lowery Jr., one of two candidates running for D.C. Bar president-elect for the 2022–2023 term. The president-elect serves for one year before becoming president, and then continues in office a third year as immediate past president.
Results of the elections will be announced on the Bar’s website and during the 2022 Celebration of Leadership on June 23 at the Renaissance Washington, DC Downtown Hotel.
Charles R. Lowery Jr. is the director of legislative policy and external affairs at New American Funding, where he shapes the company’s legislative and regulatory research and analysis. Building on 20 years of experience in mortgage and housing advocacy, he works with national organizations to advance the company’s mission of increasing minority homeownership.
Previously Lowery served as director of state regulatory relations for Ocwen Financial Corporation and as interim senior director and director of fair lending for the NAACP. In addition, he was acting director of Military Saves, a program coordinated by the Consumer Federation of America that encourages savings and helps reduce debt among military members. He holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford University and a JD from the University of Michigan Law School.
Lowery has served the D.C. Bar in many capacities, including as both member and co-chair of the District of Columbia Affairs Community, treasurer of the Bar, and member of the Board of Governors. He is currently a member of the Communities Committee and chairs the Best Practices Subcommittee of the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group.
Lowery also serves as board member of Unity Health Care and Bright Beginnings as well as a member of the District of Columbia Advisory Committee of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He is active in the historic Shiloh Baptist Church congregation.
Describing himself as an “everyman’s lawyer,” Lowery says that his career — which has included employment with legal aid and nonprofit organizations such as the Center for Responsible Lending, in the federal government with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the U.S. Department of Defense, in the D.C. government’s Department of Banking and Financial Institutions, and with consumer advocacy groups — gives him a broad perspective of the legal practice. “I’ve been in the trenches, doing the work,” he says. Interactions with boards, CEOs, and government agencies have equipped him to build coalitions that can result in action. “I want to bring that perspective to the Bar,” he says.
Lowery adds that the D.C. Bar has a responsibility to lead in diversity, equity, and inclusion. “I don’t want to see the social justice issues that have arisen over the past few years to just fade into the background. There is more to accomplish,” he says. “The ABA and a number of other state bars have programs, like the New York City Bar’s pledge, that we could do to enhance our role at the D.C. Bar around DEI.” He sees the DEI initiative as one way that the Bar can draw the interest and participation of new attorneys.
Acknowledging that young attorneys, like his son, are under significant time constraints, Lowery says it’s still important to ask, “What is the Bar offering to young lawyers that are coming up, so that they don’t see it as simply a fee and a membership, but that they really get something out of it, like the CLE classes and the opportunity to engage in issues?”
