Frederica Smith Wilson (born Frederica Patricia Smith, November 5, 1942) is an American politician who has been a member of the United States House of Representatives since 2011, representing Florida's 24th congressional district. Located in South Florida, Wilson's congressional district, numbered 17th during her first term, covers a large swath of eastern Miami-Dade County. The district contains most of Miami's majority-black precincts. Wilson gained national attention in 2012 for her comments on the death of Trayvon Martin. In May 2026, Wilson announced her retirement.
Wilson is a member of the Democratic Party. The seat to which she was elected became available when the incumbent, Kendrick Meek, ran for a seat in the Senate in 2010.
Wilson is known for her large and colorful hats, of which she owns several hundred. She has gone through efforts to get Congress to lift its ban on head coverings during House sessions, which dates to 1837.
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Early life, education, and early career
Wilson was born Frederica Smith on November 5, 1942, in Miami, Florida, the daughter of Beulah (née Finley) and Thirlee Smith. Her maternal grandparents were Bahamian. Wilson earned her bachelor of arts degree from Fisk University in 1963 and her master of arts degree from the University of Miami in 1972, both in elementary education. She served as the principal of Skyway Elementary School in Miami. In 1992 she left her position as principal to serve on the Miami-Dade County School Board. While a member of the school board, Wilson started 5,000 Role Models of Excellence, an in-school mentoring program.
Florida Legislature
Wilson represented the 104th district in the Florida House of Representatives from 1998 to 2002. She then represented the 33rd district in the Florida Senate from 2002 until her election to Congress in 2010, when term limits prevented her from running again. She served as Minority Leader Pro Tempore in 2006, then Minority Whip.
An early supporter of Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, she voted for Obama and Joe Biden in 2008 as one of Florida's presidential electors.
U.S. House of Representatives
Committee assignments
For the 119th Congress:
Committee on Education and the Workforce
Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education
Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Subcommittee on Aviation
Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines, and Hazardous Materials
Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment (Ranking Member)
Caucus memberships
Congressional Black Caucus
Congressional Arts Caucus
Congressional NextGen 9-1-1 Caucus
Congressional Progressive Caucus
Congressional Equality Caucus
Medicare for All Caucus
Congressional Caucus on Turkey and Turkish Americans
Congressional Taiwan Caucus
Congressional Caucus for the Equal Rights Amendment
2010 election
When Kendrick Meek retired from Florida's 17th congressional district to run for the United States Senate in 2010, Wilson ran for the open seat and won the Democratic nomination. She won the November 2 general election without electoral opposition in a district where the Democratic nomination is tantamount to election.
Tenure
During the 117th Congress, Wilson voted with President Joe Biden's stated position 100% of the time according to a FiveThirtyEight analysis.
During the 119th Congress, Wilson has not appeared in Congress since April 17, 2026, missing 43 consecutive votes as of May 13, 2026; although she has remained active on social media, she has not provided a public explanation of this absence. By June 2026, Wilson had missed 44.5% of all votes in 2026.
During her career as an educator, Wilson founded the 5000 Role Models program, which seeks to bring down dropout rates. Since her time in the Florida legislature, she has strongly opposed standardized testing. She has expressed concern with the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT), suggesting that the funds spent administering it would be better spent on improving education by hiring more teachers, and proposing in 2012 that tutoring companies be banned from exploiting vulnerable children, "even if it means banning companies like Ignite! Learning, founded by ex-Governor Jeb Bush's brother, Neil".
Wilson has vocally opposed the Tea Party. At a Miami town hall meeting in 2011, she told citizens to remember that the Tea Party is the real enemy and that they hold Congress hostage. She said they had one goal: "to make President Obama a one-term president".
Wilson took a vocal stance in the death of Trayvon Martin, a constituent of hers whose family she said she had known all her life. She was both praised and criticized for saying shortly after the killing that the motive of the accused, George Zimmerman, was racism. She suggested in March 2012 that Zimmerman had "hunted" Martin based simply on his race. She said, "Mr. Zimmerman should be arrested immediately for his own safety."
In March 2012, in a statement on the House floor, Wilson said, "Justice must be served. No more racial profiling!" Calling the incident a "classic example of racial profiling quickly followed by murder", she called for Zimmerman to be arrested. Wilson organized a rally in Miami on April 1, 2012, calling for Zimmerman's imprisonment. She criticized Florida's self-defense gun law, the "Stand Your Ground" law, in the wake of Martin's killing, even though she voted for it as a legislator. She said that when new laws work against the people, the laws "should be looked at and repealed". In April 2012, Wilson said that Martin's death was "definitely" murder. On July 13, 2013, a jury acquitted Zimmerman of the charges of second-degree murder and manslaughter.
2026 retirement
In May 2026, Wilson announced that she was retiring and would not seek reelection. She did not immediately endorse a successor, naming Oliver Gilbert in June 2026.
Personal life
Wilson married Paul Wilson in 1963 and was widowed when he died in 1988. She has three children. She is an Episcopalian.
Wilson is an avid wearer of hats. She has a large collection that includes hundreds of hats of different varieties. She is known to wear one every day. During the tenure of former House Speaker John Boehner, she unsuccessfully asked him to waive the United States House of Representatives ban on head covering. The rule was partially relaxed after the election of two Muslim women to congress in 2018, one of whom, Ilhan Omar, wore a hijab to her swearing in on January 3, 2019.
Wilson is a member of The Links, and of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.