Labeled “Antifa militant” by Andy Ngo and “quite profound” by Chuck D of Public Enemy, AWKWORD has fought for justice and equality through protest song, political organizing, digital strategy and street journalism for nearly a quarter century. He is a co-founder of TEN DEMANDS, co-creator of Ten For Justice: The Road to Abolition, and founding member of Our United Left.

Raised by an activist mother radicalized during the Civil Rights and Vietnam War eras, AWKWORD converted from troubled graffiti artist and Nazi destroyer — angry and acting out at the world’s injustices — to productive organizer at 16, when he collaborated with the Anti-Defamation League to establish what would become his (predominantly Christian, conservative) high school’s annual Diversity Day. That year, he also created his school’s Holocaust Remembrance Day, and spoke for the first time at the town’s Martin Luther King Day celebration.

At Vassar College, AWKWORD served as co-chair of the Student Activist Union, co-founded the Justice Group, and earned his degree in Sociology, with a focus on the intersections of race and class, the prison industrial complex, and homelessness and the politics of public space.

Since the early 2000s, AWKWORD has lobbied New York State Congress for the repeal of the Rockefeller Drug Laws; sued New York State to reinstate the 2020 Democratic Primary and add Bernie Sanders back on the ballot; worked pro-bono at Green Haven maximum security prison, an alternative-to-incarceration center and a number of teen centers, after-school programs and homeless shelters; created rap songs and videos used or sponsored by Occupy Wall Street, the New York Civil Liberties Union, The Ocean Project, and the union movement in Wisconsin; taught Hip Hop Education as a guest speaker at high schools, colleges and universities; and served as strategic consultant to Songs for Good.

He has also toured the United States as a performing artist; served as an Audiomack Verified Tastemaker, spotlighting alternative Hip Hop music; acted as brand ambassador for Refuse Fascism and Aerosoul Limited; produced cultural content for Mass Appeal, Elemental, YRB, RIME, and Fly Paper; managed Nigerian American rapper Chisom; secured hundreds of premium press placements, including Complex, MTV, Village Voice, MSNBC’s The Grio, VICE, The Fader, Prefix Mag, Hot 97, XXL, The Source, and Vibe; and released the first-ever 100% for-charity global Hip Hop project, World View, with all profits going to educate and empower at-risk youth to reduce gun and gang violence in urban areas.

Today, AWKWORD is continuing to organize with TEN DEMANDS, coordinating with a collective of activists on a national mutual aid network, delivering timely content through his AWKWORD INTERVIEWS youtube series, and working on his first new album in more than six years