Day: November 15, 2021

For attorney Esther Agbaje, the desire to make a difference sealed her case for seeking elective office.

"I have always had jobs that were in this space of helping people," said Agbaje, who worked on human rights cases with the U.S. State Department, defended tenants from eviction as a law student and currently tries to aid sick or injured individuals through medical malpractice lawsuits.

But those roles left her asking, "How do we help more people at once? Often that means going to a lever of government."

Agbaje is wrapping up her first year in the Minnesota State Assembly, helping pull the legislative lever in the Upper Midwestern state. Elected in November 2020 as a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party — Minnesota's version of the Democratic Party — she represents District 59B, encompassing downtown Minneapolis and parts of the city's near north side.

"It's a pretty vibrant district. It's got diversity in its economic classes, and it's got diversity in its ethnic groups and racial groups," Agbaje said. "And it's really just a fun place to live."

The 35-year-old was born a few kilometers away, across the Mississippi River in St. Paul, the state's capital. Her parents had come from southwestern Nigeria — he from Ekiti state, she from Ogun state — and met as students at the University of Minnesota. They married and had Esther and two younger sons.

Agbaje's father, John, is an Episcopal priest. Her mother, Bunmi, a retired librarian, at one point ran a homeless services center.

"As a child of parents whose mission was to serve others, I have followed in their footsteps throughout my life," Agbaje wrote on her campaign website.

While majoring in political science at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., she advocated for labor rights. While earning advanced degrees — a master's in public administration from the University of Pennsylvania, and a law degree from Harvard — she worked on building healthy communities, preventing homelessness and assisting renters. In between, she worked for the State Department's U.S.-Middle East Partnership Initiative managing projects to build more independent judiciaries and to advance women's and minority populations' rights in Egypt and in Gulf countries.

"After law school, I wanted to come home," Agbaje said. "And home to me is Minnesota."

'Hands in the dirt'

Agbaje returned to Minnesota in 2017, joining the Minneapolis law firm of Ciresi Conlin as an associate, mostly working on its medical malpractice team. She also volunteers with Hennepin County Housing Court, St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral and local environmental justice organizations.

Many Saturday mornings find her alongside youngsters in lower-income neighborhoods, pulling on work gloves to plant saplings or clean up debris.

"She's showed up to do the work with us, to plant the trees, to start a new garden," said Analyah Schlaeger dos Santos, who coordinates youth programs for Minnesota Interfaith Power & Light. The nonprofit organization's projects include building up the tree canopy to improve climate and community health.

Schlaeger dos Santos praised Agbaje's ongoing engagement.

"She puts her hands in the dirt with community members, and that speaks volumes," she said.

Agbaje, whose lawmaking duties are considered part time, also volunteers at pop-up workshops on rental assistance and legal aid.

"My role is really to help the community where I can," she said, "whether that's putting forward policies and legislation to (address) problems that help all Minnesotans or directing people to resources at other levels where they can receive direct help."

Changing demographics

Agbaje's district has sleek and soaring downtown buildings, sports stadiums and parks, businesses large and small, tidy neighborhoods and tent communities.

Its nearly 50,000 residents are minority-majority, with white residents accounting for the largest share (42%), then Black residents (37%), followed by a mix of Asian, Hispanic and other residents, Census data show. There's "a significant population of African Americans, East Africans, Hmong Americans and some Latin people as well," Agbaje said.

Agbaje said she wants to make sure "that the voice of this community also resonates with the rest of the state." She stressed that Minnesotans are "people from all types, all walks of life, and that our policies across the state should reflect that."

One in five Minnesotans identify as "other than white," state data show, While earlier waves of immigrants came from Europe, in recent decades they've come from Mexico, Somalia, India, Laos and Vietnam, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

As the general population's composition has shifted, "the demographics have been changing in the legislature in some pretty important ways," said Christina Ewig, a professor at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School of Public Affairs and director of its Center on Women, Gender and Public Policy. She has analyzed data from the current state legislature, where 12.4% of its members self-identified as Latino or Hispanic, Hmong, Native American and Black or Somali American — up from 3% two decades ago.

Agbaje represents part of that change, Ewig said, adding, "It's really important to have a diversity of views in your legislature for a healthy democracy."

Lessons in negotiating

In the Minnesota Legislature, Republicans control the Senate, and the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party controls the House. The division has taught Agbaje more about the art of negotiating.

"When you're campaigning, you're very full of ideas, and you're full of hope, and you're full of vision, which stays with you once you start legislating," she explained. But then, it's a matter of convincing Minnesota's 200 other state legislators "to bring your idea and your constituents' ideas into fruition to create policy and change. So, there is much more negotiating once you become a legislator."

Agbaje has brought forward ideas shaping a handful of new measures. Most involve housing, given her service on the Assembly's Housing Finance and Policy Committee.

One measure protects renters from eviction for nonpayment, through June 2022, if they have applied for pandemic-related federal aid. Another, which Agbaje said she is "really proud" of sponsoring, allows individuals to retrieve personal records and medical equipment from rental storage units before the contents are auctioned off because of nonpayment. It's aimed at helping vulnerable people, such as those fleeing domestic violence or who otherwise are homeless.

Agbaje was disappointed when Minneapolis voters in early November defeated a controversial and closely watched proposal that she endorsed to revamp the city's policing and fold it into a new Department of Public Safety. The proposal arose from demands for racial justice following the May 2020 killing of George Floyd by a white Minneapolis police officer who knelt on the Black man's neck.

"It's unfortunate that it didn't pass," Agbaje said of the proposal, which she said nonetheless may have laid a foundation for change.

"The fact that 44% of people said that they wanted to try something different is good news. And also, even the people who voted it down, if you talk to them, do still want some type of police reform."

Asked about Nigeria's #EndSARS protests last year against police brutality, Agbaje drew a parallel.

"Young people were rising up, standing up against a government" that should work for them, she said.

"I applaud their efforts," she added, along with those of "young people across the United States and across the world who are standing up and saying, 'You know, our rights count for something.' I wholeheartedly agree with them and want them to succeed in their efforts."

Source: Voice of America

On a warm August evening, assembly member Samba Baldeh mingled among the picnickers outside his home here, sharing laughs and making sure they'd had enough grilled chicken, meat pies and the West African pudding called thiakry.

Elected in America

VOA is profiling several emerging U.S. politicians with family ties to Africa who are helping to change the face of American politics. They include:

Esther Agbaje, Minnesota House of Representatives

Samba Baldeh, Wisconsin State Assembly

Omar Fateh, Minnesota State Senate

Adeoye Owolewa, D.C. 'shadow' member for U.S. House of Representatives

Naquetta Ricks, Colorado General Assembly

"It's hard work, and usually it's hard to satisfy everybody," said Gaelle Kane, a home care coordinator, dressed in festive Senegalese attire. She was commenting less on Baldeh's hosting techniques than on his political skills.

"Samba is a very good man," she said. "Anything that happens, he informs us."

Baldeh organized the picnic as belated thanks for supporters who helped elect him to the Wisconsin State Assembly — far from his birthplace in Gambia. In January, he became the first native African and first Muslim to serve in that legislature.

At age 50, Baldeh has a voice in shaping legislation for the Upper Midwestern state and its 6 million residents. It's a limited voice, given that he's a first-term Democrat in a legislature dominated by Republicans.

But he enjoys hearty support — 80% of the vote — in his heavily Democratic district, which includes part of the capital city of Madison, home to the University of Wisconsin. District 48 is majority white — 68%, according to the latest Census data — and a hub for recent immigrants from Latin America, Asia, Africa and elsewhere.

Baldeh holds himself responsible for promoting the interests of all his constituents. Yet he remains mindful of the country and continent from which he came.

"I know I'm elected here in the United States," he told VOA, "but I see it as part of my responsibility that Africa, as a whole, is my constituency."

Linda Vakunta, Madison's deputy mayor for housing, expanded on her mentor's philosophy.

"Samba really is a shining light for us," she said in brief remarks to the picnickers, many of them from the continent, like her. "He always says that we have two homes: back in Africa and here. We should be just as involved here as we would be if we were back home."

Rural roots

Gambia is Africa's smallest country, with 2.2 million residents on a sliver of land embedded in Senegal. Baldeh, one of nine children in a family of ethnic Fulani herders, grew up in the rural village of Choya.

"My parents were farmers. They mainly raised cattle and goats and sheep," which he helped tend as a boy, he said.

He persuaded his family to sell off some livestock to cover costs of his high school education in another town. "I personally forced my way into school," he said.

Afterward, Baldeh helped organize the Kanifing East Youth Development Society, which got some U.S. government funding for a youth center offering training in sewing, carpentry and other skills.

Baldeh's growing experience in youth leadership later brought international travel opportunities, including to a conference in Washington, D.C., in early 1999 where he met a participant from the Madison Area Technical College. By year's end, Baldeh had moved to Wisconsin to study at MATC, training that would launch his career as a software engineer and information technology project manager.

At first, Baldeh was shocked by Wisconsin's winter cold — temperatures can drop to minus 28 degrees Celsius — but he grew to appreciate it. The former country boy said he quickly warmed to a different aspect of the state: "That it is called (America's) Dairyland," based on its reputation as a leader in U.S. dairy production.

A legacy of service

At MATC, Baldeh founded the African Students Association for students grappling with immigration issues, financing and cultural differences. Later, he volunteered with youth development programs such as Boys & Girls Clubs of America and with civil rights groups such as the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). He witnessed struggles.

"Housing for communities of color particularly was very bad," Baldeh said. He also saw shortcomings in race relations and government services.

"Inequalities (were) really what triggered me to consider running for office," he said.

Baldeh sought and won a seat on the Madison Common Council, serving from 2015 to early 2021, including a term as its president. He ran for the Assembly in 2020.

Representative Sheila Stubbs, an Assembly colleague and chair of the Wisconsin Legislative Black Caucus, on which Baldeh serves as secretary, "worked closely on justice issues" with him, she said.

"He stands up for the rights of people [who] are marginalized," she said. "He makes sure that immigrant voices are heard and responded to."

In the Assembly, Baldeh has co-sponsored a bill to reduce the use of polyfluoroalkyl substances — long-lasting chemicals that can contaminate drinking water, food and air. He hopes to advance legislation to make affordable housing more accessible. He wants to reduce the high price of prison phone calls, which experts say deters inmates from maintaining important family ties. He has pressed the governor's office for more assistance to immigrants.

Early in his council tenure, Baldeh got assigned to a committee on Sister Cities International, a nonprofit citizen diplomacy network. He helped Madison add its first African city — Kanifing, Gambia — to its roster of partners.

Kanifing faces a challenge that resonates with Baldeh and his legislative concerns about environmental hazards in Wisconsin.

The Gambian city harbors the sprawling Bakoteh dumpsite in a congested residential area. Kanifing sent a Gambian delegation to Madison to tour waste-management facilities and meet with engineers and others for ideas. Madison, working with private investors, has supplied Kanifing with some household garbage bins and garbage trucks. Experts at the University of Wisconsin also are working on solutions.

As a developing country, Gambia benefits from the exchange, Baldeh said, stressing that his adopted city and state do, too.

"Madison can also learn from them how diversity works within (Gambian) tribes," he said.

Visit to Gambia

In August, Baldeh traveled to his home country with Jerreh Kujabi, another Gambia native, who leads the Madison-Kanifing Sister Cities pairing. Kujabi is Baldeh's close friend, business partner and former campaign adviser. The two met with Gambian

officials, local leaders and the public to strengthen the sister-city bond, and to encourage education, trade and employment on both sides of the Atlantic.

Baldeh, who serves on a committee of the U.S. State Department's Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI), wants to see more opportunity in Gambia and elsewhere in Africa — in part so fewer people feel compelled to leave.

One of his nephews died in 2018 while trying to make his way to Europe to find work. Baldeh said his family's tragic loss is far too common in Gambia, where nearly 60% of its population is under age 25. "Basically, there are no job opportunities," he said.

For Baldeh, the Gambia trip's highlights included visits with his mother and other relatives, as well as a lunch meeting with President Adama Barrow.

"To me, that is very special and humbling, and something that I would remember for a very long time," he said of Barrow, who seeks a second term in the country's December 4 elections.

Baldeh returned to Wisconsin carrying ideas about expanded markets, technology consultation, and investment "that goes beyond just Europe or the Americas or Asia." He'd like to see a Wisconsin trade mission to Africa that includes Gambia.

Nearing the end of his first year as a state legislator, Baldeh said he's grateful for "the opportunity to introduce legislation that has serious consequences on people's lives. … I really enjoy going out there and meeting with constituents and talking about things that they care about."

He chafes at "the political part" of his job. "This country is so polarized, even at the local level, at the state level," he complains.

Yet Baldeh has joined in the fray. In an opinion column for the Wisconsin State Journal, he called a Republican tax cut proposal "a sleight-of-hand trick," one that "includes a bombshell that will detonate in two years."

Asked whether he would consider a lengthier return to Gambia, Baldeh paused.

"Honestly, I hold myself accountable to making this world a better place," he said. "And so, if the impact from Africa will be much bigger than what I'm able to do in the United States, it's a big possibility."

Gaelle Kane, one of the Madison picnickers, imagines an utterly different path for Baldeh.

"I think he should run for the U.S. Senate," she said.

Source: Voice of America

Naquetta Ricks was 13 years old when three soldiers came to her family’s home in Monrovia, Liberia, searching for her mother’s fiancé, a government official.

"They held my mother at gunpoint for over two hours while my sister and I watched," Ricks said, cringing at the memory. The soldiers found the official, Cyril A. Bright, hiding in the house and, after interrogating the couple in the driveway, tossed him into the back of a pickup truck.

"By the grace of God, really, they left my mom and they took off," Ricks said.

Mother and daughters hurriedly packed a suitcase and fled to a relative’s home. Bright and 12 other deposed ministers were later tied to poles on a Monrovia beach and shot by a firing squad — casualties of the 1980 military coup.

Within two months of the interrogation, the family escaped to the United States and joined relatives in the western state of Colorado.

Ricks, 54, is now a lawmaker in the Colorado General Assembly, elected in November 2020. A Democrat, she represents the 40th District just east of Denver, including Aurora, the city where she grew up.

Hers is one of the most diverse districts in a state where almost one in 10 residents is foreign-born — mostly from Latin America, with Asians and Africans following — and another one in 10 has an immigrant parent.

Ricks is the first Black immigrant elected to Colorado’s Statehouse. A mortgage broker and co-founding president of the African Chamber of Commerce of Colorado, Ricks said her decision to seek public office was influenced by the struggles of "coming here as an immigrant."

"When we came, my mom applied for political asylum, and we were not able to prove our case" that Liberia’s political turmoil posed personal risk if they were to return, Ricks said. "But, you know, we're not lawyers. We were not able to defend ourselves in court."

Route to citizenship

Rick’s family found a pathway to citizenship in 1986, when then-President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act. The law not only tightened enforcement but also made unauthorized immigrants who had arrived before 1982 eligible for amnesty. Ricks became a U.S. citizen in her early 20s.

In June 2021, she stood by Governor Jared Polis as he signed legislation that she helped sponsor making Colorado the first U.S. state to establish a legal defense fund for low-income immigrants facing deportation.

"It will help immigrants like my family who came here, who did not have a lawyer," Ricks said, recalling her late mother, Mariam Eudora Ash.

This session, Ricks also successfully championed several other pieces of legislation aimed at accelerating the growth of small businesses, diversifying the ranks of Colorado’s teachers, and establishing a pilot project for renters to build credit history and improve access to loans. The measures’ passage was smoothed by Democrats’ control of both legislative chambers and the governorship.

"What I see from Representative Ricks is a ton of work to represent her constituents, and especially those who are often forgotten in the political process," said Michal Rosenoer, the former head of Emerge Colorado, part of a national organization that has trained Ricks and other Democratic women to run for elective office.

"It speaks to the importance of having people who can understand the problems of their community in positions of power to change those circumstances," Rosenoer said.

Political heritage?

Ricks said she never set out to become a politician, but politics "does run in my blood" and extended family.

Her paternal grandfather, John Henry Ricks, had been a state representative in Liberia "before I was born," she said. Her maternal step-grandfather, General Glakron Gblodell Jackson, was superintendent of Bomi County and was killed after ousted politician Charles Taylor launched a rebellion in late 1989 that brought years of civil war and a quarter-million deaths.

"When Naquetta said she was going to run, I smiled because I said she was going to take Papa’s place" in politics, said Adriana Henderson, Jackson’s daughter and Ricks’ maternal aunt.

Henderson lives in Aurora outside of her niece’s district, so she couldn’t cast a vote of support. But she is a fan.

"When I went to her swearing-in (ceremony), I was so elated," Henderson said. "I am very proud of her. … Coming from our little African community, we try to uplift each other."

Ricks describes herself as "a person of faith," baptized at 13 as an evangelical Christian in Liberia.

"I keep praying. I fall down, I get up," she said.

Ricks’ faith sustained her through two unsuccessful bids for public office — the University of Colorado Board of Regents in 2014, and the Aurora City Council in 2017 —– and when she ran for the Assembly seat. She was the underdog, challenging an incumbent Democrat, an African American who had party leaders’ support. But Ricks enlisted friends and associates to assist with campaign outreach. In the general election, she claimed 59% of the votes.

A handful of Ricks' backers, mostly immigrants from Africa, gathered one June morning at Endless Grind, an Ethiopian-owned coffee shop in Ricks’ district. Among them were a Cameroon-born health worker who organized a COVID-19 vaccination clinic; a local businessman who promotes African culture; a Nigerian pastor; a Kenya-born policy analyst interning at Ricks’ office; and the U.S.-born executive director of the African Chamber of Commerce.

Kabongo Serge-Patrick, a Congolese-born chef, said he was "the first to jump in the line" to gather signatures endorsing Ricks. With her election to the Assembly, "Now we have a voice to see how we can prosper here in America," he said of African immigrants.

'Globally engaged'

On a driving tour of her district, Ricks strolled outside Aurora Central High School, where she arrived as a shy freshman. Then, she was one of few students of color. Now the school’s 2,200-some students are a widely diverse mix, predominantly Latino. The public school system reports its students speak in more than 160 languages.

A banner near the entrance declares the high school’s ambition "to graduate leaders who are self-aware, locally active and globally engaged."

Ricks embraces those ideals. Aside from her work in the Assembly, she continues advocating for entrepreneurs and small businesses through the African Chamber. She has brought investors to Liberia, hoping to create opportunities for them, as well as "to incentivize people to create businesses" and jobs in the West African country, she said.

She has looked out for her home country in other ways. When the deadly Ebola virus swept into Liberia in 2014, Ricks "was on almost all the radio stations soliciting materials," said Daniel Moore, a past president of the Liberian Community of Colorado. "We were able to ship a containerload of medical supplies and food items."

Two years later, Ricks created a nonprofit foundation to support socioeconomic empowerment of Liberian youth and women. "I’m passionate about helping young people reach their full potential," she said.

Earning recognition

In Colorado, Ricks’ legislative efforts are getting recognition. In October, the Colorado LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce honored her as Government Official of the Year for advocating "inclusion and diversity within the larger business community." The state’s Independent Bankers Association and nonprofit housing group Habitat for Humanity both awarded her for championing the legislation for the pilot program to help renters improve credit scores.

In the next legislative session, Ricks anticipates more work on consumer protection, education and immigration issues. She emphasized that she works on behalf of all her constituents.

"I do talk a lot about underserved communities and underrepresented communities," she said, "but I care about all of my community. … We do have the same needs, whether it’s education, health care, you know, financial opportunities, jobs, small business. We all want a place that's functioning, where we can all thrive and grow."

Source: Voice of America

Adeoye "Oye" Owolewa has a full-time job as a pharmacist, providing medications and health advice to clients in Washington, D.C. He also works on what he sees as a vital prescription for the overall well-being of the District of Columbia — making it the 51st U.S. state.

"Right now, we pay taxes. We pay our fair share as American citizens," said Owolewa, the U.S.-born son of Nigerian immigrants. "We don't get back what everybody else does. … A lot of people outside of D.C. don't understand the inequity, inequalities, of what's going on here in the nation's capital. They don't understand that there are 700,000 Americans who lack voting representation in Congress."

In November 2020, nearly a quarter-million Washington voters elected Owolewa to a two-year term as their "shadow" U.S. representative, joining two longtime "shadow" senators. (Owolewa prefers the term "unseated.") Though the district acknowledges them as elected officials, Congress does not. They can't serve on congressional committees or speak on a chamber's floor, unlike Eleanor Holmes Norton, the district's nonvoting delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives, who serves on several committees and subcommittees.

Their main mission is to advance statehood. Success would give the District autonomy over its budget and local laws, currently subject to approval by Congress. Statehood also would give D.C. two seats in the Senate and one in the House. But because voters in the minority-majority district overwhelmingly support Democrats, the quest for statehood faces strong Republican opposition — especially given a Senate now divided at 50 seats for each major party.

"In the short term, the prospects of (statehood) are fairly bleak right now for passage," said Stella M. Rouse, a University of Maryland professor of government and politics who directs its Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement.

Influenced by parents

Meanwhile, with his elected position unpaid, Owolewa continues "my daily practice as a health care professional. And what that has done is inspire me to also focus on health care just as much as D.C. statehood," he said.

Both roles involve a commitment to education and public service that was nurtured by his parents, Owolewa said.

They had come separately from Nigeria — his father from Kwara state and his mother from Oyo state — to study in Boston, Massachusetts. They met at Northeastern University, earning degrees in medical technology and civil engineering, respectively. They married and had five children; 31-year-old Adeoye, nicknamed Oye, is their fourth.

"We were raised with the love of science, the sense of community, the duty to give back," Owolewa said at an October online youth summit sponsored by the Nigerian American Public Affairs Committee (NAPAC) Foundation, a nonprofit organization. "So, that led me to becoming a pharmacist."

At Northeastern's School of Pharmacy, Owolewa was the only Black male in a graduating class of 150. He'd seen other minority students "falling out" of the program, lacking sufficient support, he told VOA. So, in his final year, with his younger brother entering the school, he created a mentoring program and matched at least a dozen beginning pharmacy students with more advanced ones.

"All of those students, they all graduated on time," he said.

He graduated in 2014, moving to Washington to work. He settled in the city's southeast, in predominantly Black and poor Ward 8. He started volunteering at health clinics, as well as in public schools, he said, "just to inspire kids that look like me" to consider careers in science, technology, engineering and math.

In late 2018, Owolewa was elected as a D.C. advisory neighborhood commissioner, encouraged by a pharmacy customer who previously had served as a commissioner.

"He was really interested in helping others," said Brianne Nadeau, now a D.C. Council member representing Ward 1. She also cheered Owolewa's quest to become the District's shadow representative.

"I think that one of his strengths is that he cares a lot about the people he serves. He's very genuine, very accessible and very dedicated."

Millenials could deliver statehood

In the past year, Owolewa has knocked on doors, encouraging Washingtonians to get vaccinated against COVID-19. He has organized workshops for small business owners on applying for assistance during the pandemic. He has pitched in at health screenings and, this fall, started a fundraiser to provide food for immigrants arriving from Afghanistan. It had raised nearly $5,000 as of early November.

All the while, Owolewa is trying to raise public awareness about statehood for D.C. — the only federal capital worldwide that does not allow citizens' elected representatives to cast votes on their behalf in the national legislative body — and to urge more participation in electoral politics.

He said he, his family and friends view his election as a Nigerian American "not only as a win for me, but also an opportunity for the younger generation to get more inspired in the political process — not even just Nigerian Americans but people from all over the diaspora."

Today's young people eventually might help deliver the D.C. statehood that Owolewa and others pursue, said Rouse, author of The Politics of Millenials.

"Millennials are, in general, a much more progressive generation than the older generation. And this has held true even as they have aged," Rouse said. With D.C.'s diversity, including a large African American population, she speculated that "as millennials get older and actually take over positions of leadership, I think … D.C. statehood probably has a much better chance."

For now, Owolewa said, he's glad for "an opportunity to really be involved in the solutions of what's going on in our community and just (to) make life just a little more comfortable, a little bit easier for the next person. And that's an opportunity that I take it very, very seriously."

Source: Voice of America

Omar Fateh prides himself on outreach, on trying to make connections and improve conditions for those living in the northern U.S. state of Minnesota – especially those in the Minneapolis district who elected him to the state Senate a year ago.

"Growing up in an immigrant household but within the American culture" has equipped him "to bridge the gap between the new immigrants as well as the folks that have been here," the U.S.-born Somali American said.

Fateh represents Senate District 62 in south Minneapolis. Its 82,000-plus residents are racially and ethnically diverse, many of northern European and African American descent, as well as of Native American and Hispanic heritage. Newcomers from Mexico, Asia, East Africa and elsewhere have made this area their home in recent decades.

In seeking office, Fateh said he relied on the counsel and support of the district’s "indigenous folks, Latino folks, East Africans, workers, renters, elderly folks – folks that care about a whole list of issues, from affordable housing to climate change."

They helped propel Fateh into office. In January, he became the first Somali American and first Muslim to serve in Minnesota’s Senate.

Jolene Johnson praised Fateh for regularly visiting Little Earth – a multiblock affordable housing complex that gives preference to Native Americans – and offering advice on resources for the community’s many struggling households.

"He doesn’t blow smoke at us. I believe he does care about us," said Johnson, a longtime resident and member of the Ojibwa tribe. "And that’s a nice feeling to have about somebody you voted for."

Political interests

Fateh, who’s in his early 30s, has been interested in politics for well over a decade.

He was born in Washington, D.C., to parents who had emigrated from Somalia. The family moved to a nearby Virginia suburb where he was raised. As a college undergraduate, Fateh interned for a Democratic U.S. congressman and, after earning a master’s degree in public administration from George Mason University, ran for an at-large seat on the Fairfax County School Board in northern Virginia.

Fateh lost that 2015 race but, as the news site MinnPost reported, he gained the insight that Minnesota, where he had relatives in the large Somali American community, might hold more promise for political office. He moved there that same year.

Working in the Minneapolis elections office and in other government jobs, "I got to meet a lot of great folks throughout the city," Fateh told VOA. One was Kaltum Mohamed, who grew up in south Minneapolis. That is where they settled when they married. "We love it here," said Fateh, now a University of Minnesota information technology business analyst.

In 2018, as a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party – Minnesota’s version of the Democratic Party – Fateh made an unsuccessful bid for the state’s House of Representatives. Less than two years later, he defeated a three-term incumbent in a primary race for the state Senate – and went on to win 89% of the vote in that November’s general election.

As a self-described Democratic socialist who promotes affordable housing and health care regardless of ability to pay, Fateh said he is "a minority within the minority party" in Minnesota’s Senate. Republicans control that chamber by a slight margin; Democrats have an edge in the House. With a divided legislature, "it was pretty difficult to come to agreement" over the state’s budget, Fateh said.

Tough vote

The new lawmaker’s district includes the site where George Floyd, a Black man, died when a police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes in May 2020. The death sparked months of protests in communities across the nation, along with demands for racial justice and police reform.

Fateh had backed a proposal – rejected by Minneapolis voters in early November – to fold the city’s police department into a broader new Department of Public Safety. It would have combined police with other professionals specially trained to respond to situations involving mental illness, addiction and housing insecurity.

"We failed to convey our positive message," Fateh wrote in a follow-up email to VOA. Instead, "we were overcome by a massive, monied effort" to recast the plan as "defund the police."

"The people of Minneapolis are understandably apprehensive about public safety considering what we have experienced in the past two years, and I think they voted defensively," Fateh said, calling for holding to account officials who nonetheless have promised reforms.

On a late September Saturday, Fateh visited what is known as George Floyd Square, a memorial site near the intersection of Chicago Avenue and 38th Street. Floyd’s image looms from a mural surrounded with flowers and signs such as "Justice. Accountability."

"Folks are coming from all over to pay their respects, look at the memorial," Fateh said, "but also coming to these Black businesses that are over here: the coffee shops, restaurants, the tea bars."

Uneven recovery

Fateh’s district suffered during the civil unrest, with many businesses – especially along the Lake Street commercial corridor – damaged by looting, arson and other violence. Some parts are rebounding, judging from the crowded aisles at the Mercado Central and from construction booming around Karmel, a Somali market crammed with stalls offering fashion, food, hair care and other services.

But struggles persist in the district where, according to census data, the median household income is about $45,000 and many live on much less.

"It has been very stressful. It has been a mental health roller coaster," said Ikram Mohamed, who runs a childcare center across from a boarded-up, fire-blackened building on Lake Street. She cited troubles with inconsistent enrollment, staffing and income because of the pandemic – as well as the presence of drug users, vagrants and prostitutes drawn to vacant structures nearby.

Mohamed was among a handful of care facility operators meeting with Fateh to discuss what they described as sometimes burdensome government regulations that disadvantage their clients and businesses.

"One of the things I try to do is bridge the gap between the immigrant community but also the government, the commissioners," said Fateh, who serves on two Senate committees involving health and human services.

Working with constituents is the part of elective office that Fateh said he finds most satisfying.

The legislative process has been less so, Fateh said. He cited two main factors: "being in a minority" and, because of the pandemic, mostly engaging with other lawmakers onscreen instead of in person.

"Debating someone in a committee hearing virtually rather than seeing them right next to you is very different, because once you log off, it's done," he observed. "But when you're in person, you connect with them on a deeper level rather than just arguing and logging off. You can have a personal conversation right afterward. And I think that's really important so that you build that level of trust and respect among each other on both sides."

Source: Voice of America