Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi

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Co-founder, Mizrahi Family Charitable Fund (2000–present) President, RespectAbility (2013–present) Columnist, Times of Israel, New Normal, The Mighty Founder, Laszlo Strategies, Inc. 1964 in Durham, N.C.

Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi (born May 8, 1964, in Durham, North Carolina) is an American disability rights activist and an advocate for Israel.^[1] She serves as president of the disability advocacy nonprofit, RespectAbility. She is also the co-founder/director of the Mizrahi Family Charitable Fund.

She has published more than 100 articles on disability issues. Of particular note are those on disability and criminal justice reform,^[2] inclusion in Hollywood,^[3] philanthropy,^[4] and faith communities.^[5]

Career[]

Journalism[]

A former political strategist, advocate, and commentator, Mizrahi writes columns for the Huffington Post,^[1] Times of Israel,^[2] and The Mighty. She has published on inclusive philanthropy in the Chronicle of Philanthropy,^[6] Non-profit Quarterly,^[7] EJewishPhilanthropy,^[8] the D5 Coalition,^[9] and NCRP.^[10] Together with Meagan Buren, she published a primer in EJewishPhilanthropy on how to make faith organizations inclusive.^[11]

Mizrahi advocates for inclusion in Hollywood as a way of reducing stigmas that harm people with disabilities.^[12] She also promotes people with "multiple minority status", supporting diversity for people of color with disabilities in Hollywood.^[13]

Non-profit leadership[]

She has co-founded multiple organizations such as The DCJCC Community Services Program, Laszlo & Associates, The Israel Project, and Laszlo Strategies. Mizrahi currently does pro bono work to help foundations and funders include people with disabilities and advance opportunities for marginalized people.

In 1987, Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi co-founded and managed the first DCJCC Community Services Program she ran through 1989. During her tenure, it helped recruit, train, and place 900 volunteers and helped 15,000 at-risk people, including hospitalized babies, teen parents, at-risk youth, working poor, homeless, and senior citizens annually. Under her leadership, the program received many awards, including:

• 1,000 Points of Light, President George Bush
• Part of the Solution, Coalition for the Homeless
• Best Program in North America, Jewish Welfare Board
• Community Service Award, Moment Magazine
• New Horizons, D.C. General Hospital
• Distinctive Service, Martha's Table
• Community Service Award, Graham Foundation

In 2002, Mizrahi co-founded the Israel Project,^[3] a non-profit educational and outreach organization. She spent 10 years as president of the group.

In 2012, shortly after stepping down from the Israel Project, Mizrahi re-established the Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm, Laszlo Strategies,^[4] which had previously been called Laszlo & Associates, where she advised clients on issues such as medical research and education. The firm previously had focused on winning candidate and issue advocacy campaigns around the world.

Mizrahi’s change from working on Israel/Jewish issues to disability issues was broadly covered in the Jewish media including in JTA,^[14] The Baltimore Jewish Times,^[15] and Tablet.^[16] Today Mizrahi is well-known as a spokesperson on disability issues. On the 25th Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, she was interviewed on the Diane Rehm show.^[17]

The PBS NewsHour interviewed Mizrahi on getting political candidates to address disability issues.^[18] She has published op-eds on employment for people with disabilities in more than 30 states, including the early caucus state of Iowa and her native state of North Carolina.^[19][20]

RespectAbility[]

In 2013, along with Donn Weinberg and Shelley Cohen, she co-founded RespectAbility, a disabilities-focused non-profit organization. She currently serves as president of the organization, which focuses on disability policy, advocacy, and empowerment of individuals with disabilities; promoting their independence, particularly in the domain of employment.

As such, she and RespectAbility have met 1-1 with 46 of America’s governors on disability employment issues.^[4] They also rank each state on their employment levels for people with disabilities.

Mizrahi is the co-author, along with Philip Pauli, Janie Jeffers, and Eddie Ellis of Disability & Criminal Justice Reform: Keys to Success.^[21] The report was featured on the PBS NewsHour.^[22]

During the 2016 election, Mizrahi and RespectAbility were extremely active in raising the awareness of the importance of the disability. Their publication, The RespectAbility Report, covered all the presidential candidates and swing races for Senate and Governor. During the election Mizrahi was quoted on page one of both The New York Times^[16] and the Washington Post.^[13] The PBS NewsHour also did a segment featuring Mizrahi and RespectAbility on the disability vote.^[23]

Mizrahi has come under fire from some within the disability community for what some perceive as racist commentary on the 2016 election.^[5] Mizrahi apologized for the comment and reaffirmed her lifelong commitment to social justice and equality.

Mizrahi and RespectAbility run the National Leadership Program to advance a diverse leadership talent pool for the disability movement. So far, more than 140 people have graduated from the program.^[23]

She also serves on the board of JCHAI, Limmud, and the Jewish Federation Inclusion Committee.

Recognition[]

Three times The Jewish Forward has named Mizrahi as one of the 50 most influential Jews in North America – each time for a different body of work. Firstly, it was for her work in organizing non-partisan democratic campaign training seminars for activists in Eastern Europe between 1989 and 1992. Most recently it was for her work in Arabic to reach out to Arabs for peace with Israel. The Forward listed her as the second most influential Jew in North America.^[24] She was also profiled with an entire chapter in the book Jewish Sages of Today.^[15]

She was given the Farfel Award by Jewish Family Services of Houston in 2018.^[25] In 2017, she was given a major award for being a role model for women by Culver Academy.^[26] In June 2018, she was honored by Sulam.^[27] In September 2019, she was named as one of the 50 most influential Jews in the world by The Jerusalem Post.^[28]

She was presented the Bettie and Bernard Farfel Jewish Family Service Award during ReelAbilities Film and Art Festival in Houston, TX.^[29]

Personal life[]

Mizrahi is dyslexic and has ADHD.^[28] She is married to Victor Mizrahi, who heads the company Mizrahi Enterprises. She earned her BA from Emory University^[5] in Atlanta in Jewish Studies and International Studies. She was profiled in the Emory Alumni Magazine.^[30] She did her Junior Year Abroad at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel. She also has completed executive training at Harvard.

References[]

External links[]

• Appearances on C-SPAN