The first time Anahita felt truly othered was in a classroom where language was a barrier and belonging seemed impossible. At eight years old, freshly moved from Denmark to the United States, she remembers the sting of being bullied for not speaking English perfectly, the isolation of being the kid who didn’t quite fit in.
Though that was her first time experiencing the challenges that come with being an immigrant and integrating into a new culture, resilience was her inheritance. Anahita’s parents became part of the Iranian diaspora, after the 1979 Revolution transformed their country’s political landscape. Their journey of seeking safety became the family’s blueprint for once again seeking a new start in the United States.
“It took many years to consider the United States home,” Anahita shares, as she recounts her early years navigating a landscape of culture shock and feeling perpetually like an outsider looking in. In the early 2000s, increased Islamophobia made Anahita feel even more othered, transforming her immigrant experience into something more complex. What had been occasional moments of otherness became persistent alienation.
These experiences of marginalization at home became a lens through which Anahita understood systemic injustice, and are the start of her community organizing journey. What determined Anahita’s career in the humanitarian sector, however, was a study abroad in Istanbul, at the height of the Syrian civil war. She witnessed displacement in its rawest form: children begging on streets, families huddled with nothing but a shared blanket. Witnessing human suffering at a formative moment, made her realize there was so much more she could do to be an agent of change through her career.
Anahita first stepped into her role as a refugee organizer in California with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), thanks to a critical grant from We Are All America, she faced a daunting challenge: creating a refugee advocacy program from the ground. “I was going door-to-door and meeting with local refugee resettlement agencies”. My vision was to bring diverse organizations together and create a comprehensive support system for refugees and newcomers across California.”
The fruits of Anahita’s labor led to the creation of the California Welcomes Coalition. This coalition represented a groundbreaking approach to refugee support, bringing together CHIRLA, Refugee Resettlement and Ethnic Community-Based Organizations (ECBOs) across California. Where previous efforts had been fragmented, Anahita’s leadership created a unified front. Her work mobilized more support for refugees at the legislative level than any previous coalition had achieved, with a laser focus on forcibly displaced individuals. Her most tangible victory came in the form of an $8 million state funding win for the ESAVN program which was won in the 2021 legislative session.
Last year, Anahita was nominated and unanimously voted to become a co-chair of We Are All America’s Advisory Committee. “Anahita is exactly the kind of leader we need at the helm of our Advisory Committee,” says Fatima Saidi, WAAA’s National Director. “From being the child who once struggled to find belonging in a U.S. classroom to becoming a national leader shaping refugee advocacy, Anahita is paving the way for more immigrant and refugee organizers to rise into positions of leadership. She’s grown CHIRLA’s refugee affairs department into a powerful force, creating space for refugee voices in advocacy where there previously wasn’t one. As co-chair of our Advisory Committee, her work will continue to help WAAA foster a leadership pipeline for immigrants and refugees—strengthening coalitions, centering community leadership, and building a national movement rooted in lived experience.”
Anahita is looking to We Are All America’s short but powerful history in thinking through the future of the coalition. “[In the beginning of WAAA] we were on the ground, we were organizing at the grassroots level and making sure we made noise and changed the public narrative around refugees and immigrants,” she recalls. She’s keenly aware that national advocacy work can become disconnected from grassroots realities. Her vision is to ensure that the work happening at the local level by refugee leaders is seamlessly coordinated with national advocacy partners. Increased engagement from WAAA’s partners and advisory committee members, as well as opportunities to meet and recalibrate in person, will be essential to how this vision plays out.
Reflecting on the path she’s taken, Anahita offers this advice to other immigrant and refugee organizers aspiring to leadership: “Celebrate the wins and acknowledge the hiccups. Don’t always think about the end goal of what you want to be or where you want to end up—because you miss out on the moments of today.”
