Meet Doug Jones, who put Ku Klux Klan members in prison and just became the first Democratic senator from Alabama this century

Marvin Gentry/Reuters

Attorney Doug Jones became the newest US senator after he defeated Republican candidate Roy Moore in an upset election win on Tuesday night, topping off an impressive career in law to become the first Democratic senator from Alabama in over twenty years.

The son of a steelworker, Jones' enjoyed an impressive career as a US attorney and prosecutor. He famously put two Ku Klux Klan members in prison for their role in a 1963 bombing.

Here's how Jones' humble beginnings in Alabama led him to the US Senate:

Jones was born in Fairfield, Alabama near Birmingham where his father worked at US Steel. After working for a steel mill himself, Jones graduated from the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, and got his law degree from Samford University in 1979.

Sources: Doug Jones for US Senate, Newsweek

He began his career working as a staff counsel at the US Senate Judiciary Committee on behalf of former Sen. Howard Heflin, the last Democrat to hold a seat for Alabama.

Sources: Doug Jones for US Senate, Newsweek

By the 1980s, Jones became an assistant US attorney. In 1997, former President Bill Clinton appointed him the US attorney in Northern Alabama. The US Senate confirmed his nomination in a voice vote.

Sources: Doug Jones for US Senate, Newsweek, Clinton White House, ABC News