The Masha Allah Mayor
It's been a few weeks since I last landed in your inbox, and honestly, the timing feels right. The season has this way of forcing a slowdown (and in the case of the federal government, a shutdown) —whether we're ready for it or not—and in that slowdown, there's room to notice what's been building beneath all the noise.
Like this: Zohran Mamdani won. In a political moment that often feels like watching dominoes fall in the wrong direction, New York's 12th District chose something different. Chose someone who's been organizing, building trust, showing up—not just performing progressive politics but living it. And in a season that asks us to reflect on what we're grateful for, what we're carrying forward, I keep coming back to this win as evidence of what's possible when we refuse to accept cynicism as strategy and choose to claim joy.
I won't pretend as if this is easy. I write this as a very proud sorta-public Somali-American who has been dodging hate speech all week thanks to Trump’s latest unhinged bigoted spiral against Somalis. To call on hope and joy feels like being asked to celebrate in a house that's on fire. But maybe that's exactly when we need to talk about momentum, about the kind of hope that doesn't ignore the flames but refuses to let them be the only story.
So this dispatch is about momentum. About the kind of hope that isn't naive but is built brick by brick, door knock by door knock, over time. About what we carry into the new year when we let ourselves believe that another world isn't just possible, it is already being built.
Let's talk about what hope looks like when it wins:
Read
- A fascinating data deep dive with Anne Kim is the pollster who helped engineer historic electoral victories in Virginia and New Jersey.
“I think it’s important to have women’s perspectives on these campaign teams, which are predominantly men. And I get even more joy when I’m not the only woman on the team, which does happen sometimes.”
- The University of Alabama suspended funding for student magazines focused on Black and women students. A group of U of A alumni stepped in to condemn the censorship and fill in the funding gap.
- Thanks to the Voting Rights Act, Mississippi voters broke through the Republican supermajority for the first time since 2011.
- She Should Run launched Local Leader Lab, an accessible virtual civic incubator for local leaders. A program for women who've been asking, "What can I possibly do that matters?"
Recall
Mariame Kamba writes:
What is your guiding question? What helps you move through chaos, fear, and a sense of being overwhelmed with the vagaries of this world? What grounds you?
If you haven’t yet identified your guiding question, perhaps take some time this weekend to brainstorm a few and then journal about them until you distill the questions into a singular one. Think too of who or what keeps you in the fight for more justice and some peace. Refer to your question when you feel unmoored and need some grounding.
What will your guiding question be?
Sabrina Hersi Issa is a human rights technologist. She is committed to leveraging innovation as a tool to unlock opportunity and dignity for all. She does this through her work in technology, media, investments and philanthropy. This is her personal newsletter.