In times of great social and political upheaval, the Grown-ish star and producer finds herself trawling through history for inspiration. “The movements we’re witnessing now are direct descendants of the movements of the past,” says the 20-year-old, commending her generation for rising to the occasion. “I’m witnessing so many peers create new tools to fight against social injustice. We are constantly evolving the ways that we move forward.”

Photograph by Renell MedranoInterview by Yohana DestaStyled by Jason Bolden

Ilhan Omar

The congresswoman is the first woman of color to be elected representative from Minnesota. Asked to name one fact that demands more attention, she says, “Black women are up to four times more likely to die from complications related to giving birth. That this particular disparity exists for Black women in the United States, in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, is unconscionable.”

Rashida Tlaib

As the eldest of 14 siblings, the Michigan native has been looking after people her whole life. She ran for office for precisely the same reasons that crowds demand justice. “I see this movement on the street—that’s where transformative change really starts, and it’s hitting us right here in the halls of Congress.”

Ayanna Pressley

The representative has served Massachusetts since 2019, working tirelessly for equality. “The reason there’s unrest in our streets,” she says, “is because there’s unrest in the lives of Black Americans, and that’s true across every issue.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

The day after a congressman verbally assaulted the Bronx-based Ocasio-Cortez on the steps of the Capitol, she sat for this portrait with the other members of the Squad. “People are really discovering their own power in a broader sense that we have not seen in a very long time,” she says. “And it’s incredible to see how people are really taking the reins for themselves in the direction of systemic change.”

Photograph by Kennedi CarterInterviews by Britt Hennemuth

“We are living in a moment where all communities throughout the margins have been impacted by an administration who has not cared for them, who has denied them their dignity,” says Cullors. The artist, organizer, educator, and popular public speaker is also the founder of Dignity and Power Now, which fights for police abolition, as well as healing and justice for incarcerated people. “Nobody can argue that everybody who isn’t white, who isn’t male, who isn’t able-bodied is under attack.”

Photograph by Wulf BradleyInterview by Danielle Walsh

An activist for more than 20 years, Garza has been heartened by the wide alliance of people demanding change: “When I see the protests happening on the streets, what I see is people of all backgrounds, all shades, all ethnicities, all fighting for the same thing: for Black lives to matter.” She emphasizes one particularly endangered group, saying, “If we want to avoid the murders of Black trans women, then we have to invest in the lives of Black trans women.”

Photograph by Djeneba AduayomInterview by Danielle Walsh

She’s made the searing Selma and When They See Us, and just launched the Law Enforcement Accountability Project. “Multiple realities are converging,” she says. “Health and grief, race and rage, culture and fear, politics and theft, economics and desperation. The fact that 2020 has been engulfed by it all, so starkly and simultaneously, is the difference for me.”

Photograph by Arielle Bobb-WillisInterview by Anthony BreznicanStyled by Jason Bolden

Nelson fights for justice for marginalized communities. “In a society predicated upon Black subjugation and structurally positioned to perpetuate Black oppression, one of the most revolutionary acts is to have unconditional love and empathy for the most marginalized among us,” she says, adding that Black women “simultaneously endure entrenched racism and sexism, the compounding effects of which often mean that their experiences of violence and racism are suppressed or overlooked.”

Photograph by Bruce BennettInterview by Nicole Chapoteau

It’s extremely rare for two Black women to lead a legacy civil rights organization, but Ifill and her deputy and right hand, Janai Nelson, have worked together for half a dozen years. Ifill was previously a law professor for more than 20 years and wrote about the traumatic echoes of lynching in On the Courthouse Lawn. “To work in the justice system and to be able to be proud of what I do and to stand for the rule of law means it actually has to be just,” she says. “This moment has strengthened me and made me more ambitious and less willing to accept that transformative change can’t happen. I know that it can happen, and I know that it must happen.”

Photograph by Shan WallaceInterview by Nicole Chapoteau

Half of the Grammy-nominated hip-hop duo Run the Jewels isn’t new to protesting. “This moment is a continuation of my activism since I was 15 years old,” he says of the ongoing fight for equality. After delivering an impassioned speech in May urging protesters not to destroy businesses in Atlanta, he’s now urging people to bolster their communities in any way they can: “I believe that very small and local acts are the foundation of effective activism.”

Photograph by Braylen DionInterview by Yohana Desta

The two-time Pulitzer-winning author of The Underground Railroad (soon to be an Amazon series) and The Nickel Boys stresses that the uprising needs to be sustained no matter what happens in November. “The protests feel different in their size, composition, longevity, and resolve,” he says. “What is not different: the fact that any reforms enacted by a Democratic administration can be undone by a subsequent Republican administration.”

Photograph by Myles LoftinInterview by Anthony Breznican

The nonbinary actor, writer, and producer plays Angel on the groundbreaking Pose. Off-screen, they work to keep the conversation on systemic racism, police abolition, and the uplifting of Black life. “I know that to the world it looks like activism because so many people can separate social justice from their daily lives,” says Moore. “But activism, as it’s called, is my daily life.”

Photograph by Lawrence AgyeiInterview by Arimeta Diop