Lilli Petersen

"It was a visceral reaction. But it was also an immediate call to action."

Mauree Turner didn’t know they'd made history on Election Day 2020. “I’d just been going and going and going,” the activist and first-time candidate tells Elite Daily. ... It wasn’t until the first article came out about them winning a seat to represent Oklahoma’s House District 88 that they learned they were also the first non-binary person elected to a state legislature in the United States.

For many voters in swing states — particularly for the voters in those states who had trouble casting their ballots — the 2020 election was extra stressful. Meera Jagadesan, 21, is one of those young voters in Pennsylvania, and she went to extreme lengths to make sure she cast her ballot in a crucial presidential election.

“Now, I’m just like, ‘Well, this is how my life’s going to be. Burnout for the next 40 years, let’s go,” Gabbie adds.

Grecia is a businesswoman at heart. Like any other millennial with ambition, the 26-year-old from Lima, Peru, knows all about hustling to make her dream come true, and in this case, that dream is a pharmacy. Recently, she’s taken a big step towards making that dream happen — she’s finally gotten running water in her home. “The hygiene is something very important and it has to be proper hygiene, for a small pharmacy," she says.

Ireland, where Maimba and Sarfraz settled, is home to about 6,000 refugees, 11% of whom are children, according to UNICEF. In addition, roughly 5,000 asylum-seekers are still awaiting a decision about their status, with the looming possibility of deportation should they exhaust their appeals. Until recently, Maimba, Sarfraz, and their families were part of the latter category.

Jeanette Bocanegra points out the irony of the situation. Her son, Jahpower, spent two years in a juvenile detention and four years in an adult facility after his arrest at age 14. She calls it the worst nightmare a parent can go through. “My son was exposed to gang violence, abuse from correction officers,” she said. “Some of the things that he experienced, at the hands of the ones supposed to care for him, for [his] safety, were things that, if I as a parent were to do to my son, I would be ar

And it's possible that laws keeping guns out of the hands of abusers are about to get looser. In a case before the Supreme Court this term, Voisine v. United States , two convicted domestic abusers are challenging the law that forbids them from owning guns, arguing that their crimes technically don't qualify as domestic assault. If the court rules in favor of them, it would narrow the definition of domestic abuse, and undermine the laws preventing those with violent histories from getting guns."