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Grace Pai
Grace Pai is the Executive Director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice | Chicago, where she leads strategy for issue-based campaigns and power-building work. Over the last ten years, she has worked towards racial, economic, and environmental justice in multiple roles and coalitions. Grace’s commitment to community combines legislative advocacy, grassroots organizing, coalition building, and leadership development to advance social change. In 2021, she led the successful campaign to require Asian American history to be taught in all Illinois public schools through the TEAACH Act – making Illinois the first state in the country to do so. Before joining Advancing Justice | Chicago, Grace was a community organizer with Reclaim Chicago and The People’s Lobby.
Grace also serves as the founding Executive Director of Asian American Midwest Progressives, a political organization established in 2018 that supports progressive candidates for elected office, and a board member of KAN-WIN, a direct service organization dedicated to ending gender-based violence in the Asian American community and beyond. She is a 2021 recipient of the Leaders for a New Chicago Award and a member of the 2024 class of Leadership Greater Chicago.