Khadija Ali Amghaiab serves as one of the Advocacy team’s legislative and policy coordinators. She first came to the League in 2021 as a campaign assistant for the People Powered Fair Maps™ (PPFM) redistricting program. In her current role, she supports state Leagues with their legislative advocacy efforts around voting rights, redistricting, and apportionment.
For many communities, being counted is not just a matter of data. It is a matter of recognition, representation, and resources. Yet for Arab Americans, this recognition has been deferred for decades and obscured under the category of whiteness, which fails to capture who we are. It is worth examining how we celebrate Arab American identity and how our institutions are coming dangerously close to rendering it invisible.
Over the last 16 months under the Trump administration, people of color and marginalized communities across the country have faced both overt and subtle forms of targeting and discrimination at the federal level. One of the less visible examples is how the federal government has handled updates to federal race and ethnicity data standards, particularly as they relate to the upcoming 2030 Census.
A proposed expansion to the racial identification categories in the US Census would increase representation for the Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) community.
Many Leagues host Lobby Days throughout their state’s legislative sessions to rally their membership around a specific bill or set of bills that they hope to see passed. Recently, the League of Women Voters of Kentucky (LWVKY) invited a member of our national staff to join their Lobby Day, and I had the pleasure of joining them!
LWV's legislative & policy coordinator shares her experience as a voting rights advocate in Tennessee.