Alexa Marie Kissinger and Gareth Thomas Rhodes were married Sept. 14 at Toro, a Manhattan restaurant. New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo officiated. On Sept. 12, a second ceremony, led by Rick Rector, the mayor of Hudson, N.Y., took place at the home of the couple’s friends, Vernon Stevenson and Paul Cassidy, in Stuyvesant, N.Y.
The couple met at Harvard, from which each received a law degree.
The bride, 29, is a judicial clerk for Judge Robert L. Wilkins of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. She previously served as an aide to Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to President Obama. She graduated summa cum laude from Arizona State University.
She is a daughter of Priscilla A. Oliveras of Gainesville, Fla., and Brian K. Kissinger of Bangkok. The bride’s father is a retired Air Force major who was last stationed at Scott Air Force Base in St. Louis. Her mother is a Latinx romance novelist whose most recent book is “Their Perfect Melody ” (Kensington Publishing, 2018). The bride’s mother is also an adjunct faculty member at Seton Hill University, where she teaches creative writing online.
The groom, 31, is special counsel to the superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services in New York and Albany. He graduated summa cum laude from the City College of New York. He previously served as an aide to Governor Cuomo and was a candidate for the Democratic nomination in New York’s 19th Congressional district in 2018.
He is the son of Margarita U. Rhodes and John M. Rhodes of Rifton, N.Y. Both parents are members of the Bruderhof community, a secluded Christian commune where members share all property and forsake personal money. He is also the son of the late Xaverie Elna Rhodes, who was also a member of the Bruderhof community.
Ms. Kissinger grew up in a military family and was home-schooled while living in five states and two countries before she turned 18. Mr. Rhodes left home at 18 with $50 in his pocket to work as a water-well driller before applying to college and getting involved in politics.
The two met in August 2015 while at Harvard Law School through a mutual friend at the White House where she was an intern the summer before her senior year at Arizona State. Ms. Kissinger later got a full-time job running regional field operations for President Obama’s re-election campaign in Virginia.
She reached out to him with a Facebook message after their first day of law classes at Harvard. “Hey Gareth — hope you survived the first day,” she wrote. “Not sure which section you’re in, but let me know if you want to do a drink or something in the next few weeks.”
Mr. Rhodes said he “was intrigued to hear from someone else at law school that had come from a public service background.”
She thought he was handsome. “But I was just getting out of a relationship,” she said, “and not really looking to get back into another one.”
They made plans to meet for a drink. But as it turned out, Ms. Kissinger was also invited to attend a Boston festival at the same time. Not wanting to cancel, she extended an invite to the festival for Mr. Rhodes, and though she “hoped he would decline,” Mr. Gareth tagged along. They traveled in a UberXL minivan, with Ms. Kissinger’s new friends in tow.
During the ride through the crowded, cobbled streets of Boston’s North End, Ms. Kissinger and Mr. Rhodes chatted while eating pirogies. “From that day, Gareth always seemed to be around,” Ms. Kissinger said, “and he was game for anything.”
Mr. Rhodes was always on the scene, always by Ms. Kissinger’s side, whether it was helping cook fajitas together for a dozen classmates on a fall break trip to Echo Lake in Maine, or helping gracefully move a Halloween party from Alexa’s apartment to the neighborhood dive bar after complaints from a grumpy neighbor.
By February 2016, they were a romantic item.
“She was beautiful and intelligent and I was completely enamored and taken by her,” Mr. Rhodes said. “She was the perfect partner in every way imaginable.”
