INTERVIEW BY SIMI KOLODKA.
Photograph provided by Katrina Hajagos.
RHONDA FIELDS, COLORADO STATE SENATOR, CO 29TH DISTRICT
On the lack of representation in politics: We just need to have more women at the table. We need more diversity at the table. I serve at the State Capitol and I’m not seeing enough women emerge at powerful positions within the State Capitol. I think it’s time that we trust black women to emerge in these powerful positions- not just in the state government…. but also as CEO’s. We just don’t see enough of those examples so that black girls, and latino girls, and Indigenous girls can see themselves as taking on that role.
On her place of special meaning: My safe, physical space is always home. Home is where I feel the most comfortable at. I have access to my refrigerator, access to my couch where I can watch TV, and I have access to my backyard where I can do a little grilling on my patio. And most of all, I have access to my neighbors and my friends.
On the issue of race in 2020: In my lifetime, in 2020, I never could have imaged the kind of assault that I am seeing on poor people, on people of color, and on our immigrant communities. Where we are separating immigrant families and putting their children in cages… and some of them never get to reconnect with their families. It’s just the sense of cruelty and the assault on people of color… it’s unsettling. I thought we were moving in a direction where all of us would be judged not based on our gender, or sexuality, or the color of our skin, or our religion- but on the content of our character, as Martin Luther King said it. And we are still not there. We have to get there, moving forward.