Camonghne Felix, MA, is a poet, writer, speaker, and political strategist. She received an MA in arts politics from NYU, an MFA from Bard College, and has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Callaloo, and Poets House. Felix was the director of surrogates and strategic communications at Elizabeth Warren for President. Her first full-length collection of poems, Build Yourself a Boat (Haymarket Books), was longlisted for the 2019 National Book Award for Poetry. Her debut was also a 2017 University of Wisconsin Press Brittingham and Pollak Prize finalist and a 2017 Fordham University Poets Out Loud semifinalist. The author of the chapbook Yolk, she was recently listed by Black Youth Project as a “Black Girl From the Future You Should Know.” Her books Let the Poets Govern and Dyscalculia are forthcoming from Penguin Random House.

Molly McGrath is the senior campaign strategist on voting rights at the ACLU’s national political advocacy department, where she leads policy and campaigns to protect and expand voting rights across the country. She has spent most of her career as an organizer on the ground based in states with suppressive voter laws, like strict photo ID laws, working one-on-one directly with voters impacted by strict photo ID law to help them obtain the ID they need to vote. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, the Associated Press, the Today Show, the Nation, MSNBC, VICE News, CNN, and other national outlets and documentaries. She is a Wisconsin native, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Wisconsin, and holds her JD from Brooklyn Law School where she received the highest award for community service hours. She has been admitted to the New York Bar.

André M. Richardson is a political practitioner and founder of the boutique consulting firm Paragon Strategies. Richardson is a cannabis investor in Massachusetts and New Jersey, and a Brooklyn-based social justice advocate. He has helped shape the Brooklyn and New York City political landscape as a senior advisor and campaign manager to some of the most influential and activist-minded candidates including Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, District Attorney Eric Gonzalez, and State Senator Zellnor Myrie. He was named one of Brooklyn’s top 50 political consultants in 2019 and 2020.

Xamayla Rose, deputy public advocate of civic and community empowerment, is responsible for shaping the Office of the Public Advocate’s programming and policies related to infrastructure for immigrant communities, electoral processes, democratic participation, community support, and civic engagement—including census outreach and inclusion and support for diverse populations. Prior to joining the Office of the Public Advocate, Rose was and continues to be known as a community organizer, government, and nonprofit professional who leads efforts in civic participation, workforce development, and anti-poverty initiatives.

Rose is a former strategist for New York City Human Resources Administration and previously served as the Youth Policy Analyst for the former Brooklyn borough president, Marty Markowitz, and as the managing director of advocacy for a co-founded nonprofit that focuses on maternal health. In 2018, she worked alongside civil rights groups to register more than 100,000 voters in Georgia and North Carolina. In each role she undertakes, Rose continues on her mission to protect and amplify the voices of our nation’s most vulnerable residents.

Prerana Reddy is a cultural producer based in NYC. Most recently she was the director of programs at A Blade of Grass (ABOG), a nonprofit organization that supports socially engaged artists with direct financial support, vibrant public programs, and field research. She also oversaw the production of a free online Municipal-Artist Partnership Guide in collaboration with Animating Democracy/Americans for the Arts and co-edited A Blade of Grass’s biannual magazine on arts and social engagement. Prior to joining ABOG, she was the director of public programs and community engagement at the Queens Museum of Art for 14 years, where she organized screenings, performances, discussions, and community-based collaborative programs and exhibits both on- and offsite. She also developed an intensive arts and social justice program for new immigrant youth as well as a community development initiative for Corona, Queens, residents.

Weeksville Heritage Center is an historic site and cultural center in Central Brooklyn that uses education, arts, and a social justice lens to preserve, document, and inspire engagement with the history of Weeksville, one of the largest free Black communities in pre-Civil War America, and the Historic Hunterfly Road Houses.