Reshma Saujani
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Reshma Saujani is the Deputy Advocate for Special Initiatives at the New York City Office of the Public Advocate and the Executive Director of The Fund for Public Advocacy. Her role as Deputy Advocate and Executive Director is to promote civic engagement and government accountability while spearheading public projects that focus on citywide job and economic growth, small businesses, public empowerment, environment-friendly infrastructures, and social/technology innovations that vastly improve the quality of life for all New Yorkers.

Reshma has worked to increase political participation among South Asian Americans and has volunteered with community organizations to register young voters across New York City. She has provided free legal counsel to immigrants in Queens, and her pro bono work as an attorney at Davis Polk & Wardwell included asylum cases to ensure representation for the most vulnerable defendants in New York City.

Reshma was also the Deputy General Counsel and the Deputy Chief Operating Officer of the Liquid Markets division at Fortress Investment Group.

Reshma earned a B.A. from the University of Illinois, an M.P.P. from Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a J.D. from Yale Law School. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and on the Board of the Women's Campaign School.

Blog Entries by Reshma Saujani

The Participatory Revolution

Posted October 19, 2011 | 10/19/11 06:56 PM ET

Over the past couple of years, I have tweeted and posted to Facebook about how the American economy is not working for the powerless, mainly young people: each day, the unemployment rate for young people creeps higher and higher (average is 18.4%, 45% for African American youth, and

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The American DREAM

Posted October 7, 2011 | 10/07/11 01:01 PM ET

No facet of our country's immigration debate is more heartless or economically foolish than our failure to support undocumented children who have grown up on American soil. These young people have gone to school alongside their native-born peers and in many cases have shown themselves to be outstanding scholars, athletes...

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Advocating for Young Americans

Posted July 28, 2011 | 07/28/11 06:13 PM ET

Just over five years ago, a young college student in New York City started dreaming up a new social software application inspired by the chaotic cacophony of taxicab communications in the city. While many of his peers were at their school's career services office trying to find a job, he...

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A New Ethic of Leadership in Broken Washington

Posted August 12, 2010 | 08/12/10 02:31 PM ET

If your car breaks down and someone recommends a mechanic to repair it, the first question you're likely to ask is: Can I trust the mechanic? Today, our nation's economic engine has stalled, and it's unclear that we can trust those in Congress responsible for getting us on the road...

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My Views on Wall Street and Our Broken Political Process

Posted July 9, 2010 | 07/09/10 09:46 AM ET

Yesterday, the Washington Post published a front-page story calling me an "Ivy-educated, Wall Street veteran" who is "embracing Wall Street" in a bid to unseat my opponent, 18-year incumbent Carolyn Maloney, in the Democratic primary. In an all too familiar media distortion that favors process over policy, this...

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Don't Just Reform Our Schools -- Transform Them

Posted June 10, 2010 | 06/10/10 09:44 AM ET

Last July, President Obama announced Race to the Top, an educational grant competition to provide critical funds to states that make concerted reform efforts, including provisions for performance-based teacher evaluations and expanding the cap on charter schools. What unfolded was a familiar political battle. Interest groups and union officials took...

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Empire State of Security

Posted May 20, 2010 | 05/20/10 09:15 AM ET

Of the many security challenges facing the United States - a nuclear Iran, a resurgent Taliban, a more sophisticated ring of international cyber terrorists - what I find equally alarming is what I recently discovered in India's Southern state of Kerala. Attending a friend's wedding there last year, in a...

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Comprehensive Immigration Reform to Create Jobs and Secure our Future

Posted April 21, 2010 | 04/21/10 09:18 AM ET

James Madison once wrote, "America was indebted to immigration for her settlement and prosperity. That part of America which had encouraged immigration most had advanced most rapidly in population, agriculture and the arts."

It's no wonder that New York City became the economic epicenter of the United States, and...

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On Women's Rights, Democrats Should Stand Up, Not Back Down

Posted March 15, 2010 | 03/15/10 06:49 PM ET

It's hard to imagine what America would be like today without Democrats who, over the years, refused to surrender their core principles.

In times of political turmoil, when difficult decisions were required, Democrats stood their ground and fought hard for the Civil Rights Act, Social Security, Medicaid, Head Start,...

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Financial Reform From Soup to Nuts

Posted February 16, 2010 | 02/16/10 08:13 AM ET

In September 1930, 11 months after Black Tuesday, the Three Stooges released their first feature film, "Soup to Nuts." America badly needed some lighthearted clowning to get through the dark days of the Great Depression, and the Stooges provided it. Today, as we work to climb out of the Great...

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Generation Innovation: Creating Jobs and Growth in New York City

Posted January 26, 2010 | 01/26/10 04:17 PM ET

E.B. White once wrote that New York is "by all odds the loftiest of cities. It even managed to reach the highest point in the sky at the lowest moment of the depression."

Those words are worth remembering today.

In its many incarnations over the past 400 years - from...

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