State Rep. Amen Brown will launch a run for Philadelphia mayor Friday

State Rep. Amen Brown, a Democrat who represents parts of West Philadelphia and has championed tough-on-crime policies like new mandatory minimum sentences, will announce a run for Philadelphia mayor Friday.

Brown, who has been in the General Assembly for two years, is hosting a campaign kickoff with supporters, according to a news release issued by his campaign. The statement said Brown intends “to prioritize public safety to protect all Philadelphians.”

He spoke recently to supporters and framed his story as an unlikely rise from poverty.

“I stand before you today, not only as your PA state representative,” he said, “but as a survivor of gun violence, a formerly imprisoned person, one of seven children whose mother was heavily addicted to drugs, whose father was incarcerated when I was 2 years old, and a person that didn’t know where my next meal was coming from.”

The 35-year-old state representative is the latest Democrat to announce a campaign ahead of the May primary to replace term-limited Mayor Jim Kenney, solidifying the field of at least nine contenders as one of the deepest in recent memory. Whoever wins the nomination will be well-positioned to prevail in the general election, given Philadelphia’s heavily Democratic electorate.

Amen Brown is the youngest candidate, and is up against ex-City Controller Rebecca Rhynhart, grocer Jeff Brown (no relation), retired Judge James DeLeon, and a handful of former City Council members: Allan Domb, Derek Green, Helen Gym, Maria Quiñones Sánchez, and Cherelle Parker.

» READ MORE: Who is running for Philadelphia mayor in 2023?

He’ll be playing a bit of catchup against other Democrats, some of whom have been campaigning and fund-raising for more than three months. The first television ads of the race began running this month and are boosting Jeff Brown.

But Amen Brown will likely have deep-pocketed backers of his own. His candidacy was announced earlier this month by New York City real estate developer Marty Burger, who introduced Brown at a fund-raiser in a Manhattan cigar bar. Sources say Burger, who has developed in Brown’s House district, vowed to seed a super PAC with $5 million.

Brown will also likely separate himself on policy, and present as one of the more conservative options on the Democratic side. He has for several years enjoyed political support from groups in Pennsylvania — including those associated with the state’s wealthiest man — that tend to back Republicans and candidates who support charter schools or expanding school choice.

He has also associated with several prominent Republicans, including GOP Senate nominee Mehmet Oz and former lawmakers who attended his New York event and said they will support his candidacy.

And he has not been shy about his positions on combating crime, especially as the city contends with a persistent gun-violence crisis.

He angered some fellow Democrats in Harrisburg last year when he introduced a bill that would have established a tiered series of mandatory minimum sentences for people with prior offenses who are convicted of illegally possessing a gun. The legislation also sought to make it easier for judges to deny bail to those defendants.

Such policies have, over decades, gradually fallen out of favor with Democrats and even some pro-reform Republicans who say mandatory sentences are inflexible and don’t allow judges to consider a defendant’s specific circumstances or culpability.

Brown steadfastly stood by the bill. But several Democrats who initially expressed support backed out, and the legislation ultimately went nowhere.

Among those who outwardly opposed the legislation was Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, whom Brown has since clashed with. Brown was one of two Democrats who sat on a House committee that hunted for grounds to impeach the progressive prosecutor and released several reports attempting to tie the DA’s policies to rising rates of crime in the city.

Krasner was impeached by the House last month largely along party lines. Brown was marked absent.

While he will undoubtedly center his public-safety messaging on law enforcement, Brown has been a proponent of other Democratic priorities and reforms.

He was part of a team of lawmakers who last year negotiated to get the state’s largest gun show to stop selling kits to make homemade firearms known as “ghost guns.” He introduced legislation that would eliminate medical copays for incarcerated people, and he authored a bill to halt sheriff’s sales in the city during the pandemic.

”We can reform the broken systems and hold folks accountable,” he said recently. “Once this happens, then we can start to restore and rebuild our beautiful city.”

The state representative has also faced legal challenges of his own. He has said he was incarcerated as a teenager, but details of his time in prison are scant and the charges are not publicly available. Under the state’s Clean Slate law, some misdemeanor charges may be automatically sealed.

And earlier this year when Brown ran for reelection, a state judge admonished him for failing to disclose “adverse financial information” that included numerous judgments and liens against him and a day-care business he co-owned.

Brown alluded to his “flaws” in remarks earlier this month, telling supporters: “I am not perfect.”

“But I guarantee you,” he said, “I will work just as hard for our city, just like I have been working for my district.”