Each spring, American Jewish World Service (AJWS) holds a Leadership Advocacy Convening, bringing a national cohort of clergy and influential Jewish leaders to Washington, D.C., to lobby for rights-based U.S. foreign policy. Unlike others seeking the attention of elected officials, AJWS’s faith-based voice opens doors on both sides of the aisle — doors normally closed to progressive advocacy, especially in this political climate.
I didn’t know any of that when I joined AJWS in December. I had been employed as a program specialist in the U.S. State Department when the administration began its systematic destruction of international aid. At State, I had to witness the termination of AJWS’s final federal grant, one more casualty of Trump’s ruinous retreat from U.S. leadership. So in March, I saw an exquisite kind of justice in celebrating my three-month AJWS anniversary by marching into Congress, alongside a powerful cohort of clergy and equipped with AJWS’s “enough is enough” message. To say I was excited — more excited than I had ever been at the State Department — would be a dramatic understatement.
The day before, AJWS staffers prepared our delegation for a planned total of 22 bipartisan Hill visits with the offices of 14 senators and 7 representatives. When training got underway, I was eager to meet the 10 rabbis — one who came from as far away as Idaho — whom I had been emailing for three months. Much to my surprise, they were equally excited to meet me.
Accompanied by Tawanda Mutasah, AJWS President and CEO, Ruth Messinger, members of the Board, and AJWS staff, we learned how to advocate on two critical pieces of legislation. One, the Haitian Women and Girls Resolution, would secure the political participation of women and girls in Haiti, groups that face the greatest adversity in this failed state; the second, the administration’s cruel expansion of the global gag rule, would compound familiar limits to reproductive health funding.
Our day-long training session was robust. Listening to Rori Kramer and Corinne Paul from AJWS’s Advocacy and Jewish Engagement team, our clergy were hearing about these overlapping crises for the first time. They learned that 1.4 million Haitians are internally displaced, that 90% of Port-au-Prince is controlled by gangs, that Haiti hasn’t hosted elections in 10 years, and that women and girls suffer the most, victims of sexual violence and excluded from positions of political power.
Details of global gag, much less its expansion, were new, too. The Trump administration has exploited a Reagan-era executive order that halted funding to foreign NGOs counseling on abortion. Now, that same rule encompasses “gender ideology” and so-called DEI as new justifications for denying foreign assistance. Under this sweeping expansion, any organization, domestic or international, that supports access to reproductive healthcare, LGBTQI+ rights, or outreach to any marginalized community cannot receive non-military foreign assistance — regardless of whether the funded program would touch on these issues at all.
Rabbis are quick learners. And so, when the time came to pay our first visit to the Hill, we were ready. Each one found a way to connect lived experience and the Jewish faith to situations lacking in justice and decency. All of our meetings were rich and detailed, and at five of them, Members of Congress themselves attended — a sign of their genuine interest.
To a former State Department employee, the contrast was stark. With AJWS, I was standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Jewish clergy from around the country condemning the administration’s actions and ensuring that AJWS’s messages were heard. I was lucky enough to cross Capitol Hill with Tawanda, our new CEO, whose words prompted several offices to sign on to the Haitian Women and Girls Resolution and investigate ways they could stand against the expanded global gag rule.
By the end of the day, I felt invigorated by AJWS’s approach to advocacy which, like its grantmaking, is personal and authentic. This newly-trained cohort proved to be as effective talking with lawmakers as they are delivering a Shabbat sermon. While saying our goodbyes, Rabbi Michael Beals of Temple Beth El in Delaware told me how he felt like a rabbi who was lobbying based on his values, not a lobbyist who happened to a rabbi. Despite significant obstacles, the focus on connection — interpersonal and spiritual— made it clear that progress on daunting global issues does not start and stop at Congress’ doors.
