Ray Bourhis is uniquely qualified to be a political pundit and an enemy of unbridled corporate and political corruption. A lawyer practicing out of San Francisco and Santa Barbara, California, Bourhis has been at the forefront of the battle against greed and excessive power for most of his life.

Bourhis grew up in the tough neighborhood of Elmhurst in Queens, New York. He credits an attempt by local street gang members to throw him, at the age of twelve, into a blazing bonfire with helping him develop the survival skills needed to spend his legal career taking on insurance companies.

Bourhis got his BA at Ohio State University. In his senior year, he created the University’s first mascot in eighty-five years with his then girlfriend, Sally Lanyon. Ray and Sally launched the mascot, unannounced, onto the football field in the middle of the marching band’s homecoming half-time show. When he waddled off the field, 82,000 fans chanted, “We want the mascot! We want the mascot!” and the OSU icon, now known as Brutus Buckeye, was born. .

After graduating from Ohio State, he took a job teaching in a rural high school in Appalachia, where he got fired for putting together a pilot project with Senator Robert Kennedy for students to work on Indian Reservations during the summer. Bourhis became one of Kennedy’s key staffers, working with the Senator on his presidential campaign.

Later Bourhis joined the Domestic Peace Corps (VISTA) and was sent to California as a community organizer with the farm workers. His passion for fighting for the underdog ultimately led him to the UC Berkeley School of Law. He decided on law as a career because he wanted to make a difference. Bourhis was inspired by the giants then serving on the Supreme Court, judges who bore little resemblance to those serving on the court today. While at Berkeley he founded a student-funded public interest law firm that was promptly vetoed by the University Board of Regents. The firm later became known as CalPirg (California Public Interest Research Group).

Since law school Bourhis has specialized in representing policyholders in cases involving the wrongful denial of long-term disability (LTD) insurance claims. His firm has set legal precedents and obtained record verdicts and settlements in that field. Again, this reflects his passion for fighting for the underdog.

Bourhis’ Billionaires and Bagmen reflects a lifetime of disdain for  what he considers the hijacking of America by an increasingly pro-business Supreme Court that has consistently ruled against “the people” and in favor of multi-national corporations. He believes and hopes that what happens with Sean Cogan and his friends in Fairview may well turn fiction into fact.

In addition to Billionaires and Bagmen, Bourhis is the author of the nonfiction book Insult to Injury and the soon to be released Preemption: A License to Steal Your Medical/ LTD Benefits. He also co-authored The Autobiography of Brutus Buckeye: As Told to His Parents Sally Lanyon and Ray Bourhis, published in 2015 to honor Brutus’ 50th birthday.

Bourhis lives in San Francisco and Montecito, CA.