Gen Z is making sure their voices are heard at the polls and in Congress. Throughout the blue wave and historic wins, Melat Kiros became the first Gen Z woman elected to Congress. At 29 years old, the Colorado democrat won the election with 78.2% of the votes, becoming Colorado’s Black congresswoman.
“I’m a new member of this delegation, and I’m also the youngest. I’m gonna learn a lot from the people in this delegation who’ve been in these buildings longer than I have, and I plan to ask a lot of questions, but I’m also gonna stay true to what Denver sent me to do,” Kiros declared in her victory speech.
Born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Kiros immigrated to Denver with her family when she was a baby. With a bachelor’s degree in political science and economics from Washington College in Maryland and a law degree from the University of Notre Dame, the U.S. Representative-elect worked as a lawyer at a prominent New York City law firm until 2023. That year, she was fired after refusing to take down an open letter she penned addressing law firms that encouraged law schools to crack down on students engaging in pro-Palestine protests.
“While the letter makes no explicit threats against one’s potential employment with the signatories’ firms, the chilling effect is undeniable. The right to question not only the legitimacy of a government but also its actions is the bedrock principle of a true democracy,” she wrote. “While the letter that over 100 US law firms (and counting) have signed condemns bigotry of all kinds, it only calls out specific examples of anti-Semitism, begging the question: do you consider some acts of hate against one group to be worse than another?”
Upon leaving New York, she returned to Colorado and worked as the director of communications for progressive candidate John Padora’s congressional campaign in 2023. She is currently earning her doctorate in public policy from the University of Denver and prior to her campaign, she worked as a barista to cover her bills and pay off student loans.
“482 days, over 8.000+ volunteers. 140,000+ doors knocked and over 500,000+ phone calls that is what it took to send a 29-year-old immigrant, barista, renter, recovering lawyer & democratic socialist to Congress,” Kiros said in her victory speech.
Though she is the first Gen Z woman to be elected to Congress, in January she will serve alongside other young politicians, including Maxwell Frost (D-Florida), who became the first-ever Gen Z member of Congress, and Michael Alfonso (R-Wisconsin), the first Gen Z Republican to serve in Congress.
Throughout her campaign, during which she intentionally rejected all corporate PAC donations, Kiros ran on a platform that prioritized Medicare for all, ending all wars, abolishing I.C.E., and implementing universal child and eldercare.
“What this victory means is that the working people of Denver, the working people of this district and, as we’re seeing tonight, the working people across this entire country are no longer accepting the status quo as it is,” she told Democracy Now. “They are fed up with this administration, and they’re also not going to tolerate Democrats trying to go back to business as usual. They are demanding a change, the kind of change that leads to material improvements in the lives of working families all across this country.”
And just as young people across the country are challenging the status quo and making their voices heard, Kiros is taking that same energy to Congress, where she sees her youth as one of her greatest advantages.
“I’m not burdened by the traditions and the norms of the past,” she previously told CBS News.
