| Senator Jabari Brisport is a life-long resident of Brooklyn -- born in Bed-Stuy and raised in Prospect Heights -- the son of an undocumented immigrant, and a proud Caribbean-American. He represents New York's 25th State Senate district which includes Clinton Hill, Navy Yard, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Ocean Hill and parts of Fort Greene, Prospect Heights, and Brownsville.
Senator Brisport became an activist more than a decade ago when he began organizing efforts in support of a bill to legalize same-sex marriage in New York. The bill was defeated in 2009 but he continued organizing around the issue until same-sex marriage was ultimately legalized in NY two years later. He continued his activism as part of the early Black Lives Matter movement and began organizing rallies and protests, as well as training protesters on what to do if stopped or harassed by the police.
At the time of his election, Senator Brisport was a math teacher at a middle school in Crown Heights and an active member of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) union. As a public school teacher, he saw firsthand how the chronic underfunding of our schools and massive increases in policing have created glaring injustices for New York's students, and how those injustices are compounded by lack of access to basic needs like housing and healthcare.
These experiences shaped his determination to fight for a just state budget that provides funding for the infrastructure and services New Yorkers need to survive and thrive, especially in times of crisis. Senator Brisport is a vocal advocate of raising taxes on the rich, and policies that place the needs of working-class people above corporate profits, including a Green New Deal, the New York Health Act, universal access to housing, and the cancelation of rent and mortgage arrears accumulated during the COVID-19 pandemic. |