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CHICAGO ACTIVIST AMISHA PATEL DIES AT 50  
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Carrie Maxwell
April 28, 2026
Windy City Times
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_ The Chicago economic, racial and gender-justice organizer died
April 24 at home surrounded by loved ones after a nine-year battle
with cancer. _

Amisha Patel speaks at a 2016 protest against predatory banks. ,
Photo courtesy of Neena Hemmady

 

Amisha Patel was born May 30, 1975, in Chicago to Indian immigrant
parents. She graduated from Stanford University in 1997 with a
Bachelor of Arts degree in anthropology. During her college years,
Patel co-founded Youth United for Community Action, an organization of
young people of color who fought for environmental and social justice
in East Palo Alto, California.In the late 1990s, Patel supported young
people by creating an award-winning documentary directed by the ACVPC
Video Team titled _Young Azns Rising! Breaking Down Violence Against
Women_, which was screened at film festivals across the United
States. It won the Best Documentary category at aMedia’s annual Ammy
Awards in 2000.

Amisha Patel rallies the crowd during the historic 2012 CTU strike.
Photo courtesy of Neena Hemmady

The project marked the beginning Patel’s lifelong work as an
organizer, which included projects aimed at combating violence against
women and transforming Chicago for working people.Her professional
accomplishments included six years as the Community Coordinator for
SEIU Local 73 in Chicago, where she organized hospital employees and
Head Start workers into a union as well as with other community
organizers in their fight to stop school closures.

 

Amisha Patel speaks at a 2016 Rauner Revenue Action. Photo courtesy of
Neena Hemmady

Patel left the SEIU to become executive director for Grassroots
Collaborative, a community-labor coalition that builds power with
working families to ensure fully funded public education, critical
services and affordable housing. She held that post for 15 years.In
2023, Patel served as a senior advisor for Mayor-Elect Brandon
Johnson’s transition committee. She also worked on various other
progressive candidates for public office as well as community and
labor campaigns.

Patel was also a co-founder of the United Working Families independent
political organization, whose goal is to elect more progressives from
Chicago to local, state and national offices. Those candidates
included included Johnson and Democratic House Rep. Delia Ramirez. Her
final organizing work included working with a broad-based national
coalition to fight authoritarianism.She organized until her death.
Patel fought for empowering young workers, increasing the minimum wage
and ensuring that TIF money was used for community improvements and
education. Patel also worked against the terror that ICE was
inflicting in Chicago.Her reach extended beyond Chicago; Patel trained
thousands of Illinois residents on race, class and gender issues. In
Peoria, for example, she helped Black parents build their power around
education justice.Patel credited her involvement in peer counseling, a
process that centers an equitable give-and-take of deep listening and
focuses on collective liberation, as key to her ability to stay
focused and creative as an organizer.In an essay for Truthout
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Patel wrote this past March, she referenced her work in co-counseling
and pointed out lessons she learned as a political organizer. She also
wrote editorials for Crain’s Chicago Business, Bill Moyers, In These
Times and Chicago Sun Times.

Amisha Patel and Neena Hemmady at their wedding. Photo courtesy of
Hemmady

Amisha Patel and Neena Hemmady outdoors near the water. Photo courtesy
of Hemmady

Patel met her wife Neena Hemmady in 2001 through the South and West
Asian LBTQ women-focused organization Khuli Zaban. Their wedding took
place at the Chicago Teachers Union Jackie Vaughn Hall in August 2019.

Patel is survived by Hemmady; mother Kusum Patel; children Ayush
Hemmady-Wright and Varsha Hemmady-Wright; brothers Nitin Hemmady
(Weiwen) and Amit Patel (Vaishali); niblings Vishal Patel, Meridith
Embry, Sahil Patel and Anishi Patel; and countless chosen family
members and friends. She was preceded in death by her father, Arvind
Patel.HEMMADY said in a Facebook post, “Amisha was my world and she
meant everything to me, as she was that to so many others. She
challenged me to be more vulnerable and more open and has made my life
so much deeper with love and connection that I never thought was
possible. I owe her my life….I will be more in love with her as each
day passes.”RAMIREZ said in a Facebook post, “We lost a longtime
Chicago leader, organizer, and my dear friend, Amisha. [She] was a
giant of our movement and she will be deeply missed. Her three decades
of work to unite diverse communities to build power laid the
groundwork for winning affordable housing, quality education and more
in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.”

                                       Amisha
Patel (center front), Neena Hemmady (wearing sunglasses), Amisha’s
mother Kusum Patel (far left), their children and niblings. Photo
courtesy of Hemmady

CLOSE FRIEND AND ACTIVIST STACY DAVIS GATES said, “Amisha was a
visionary and had great resilience on a personal level. Amisha’s
ability to fight for her life made me trust her when it came to
fighting for the lives of Black children in this city. There are a
long list of charlatans who say that they’re fighting for
marginalized populations [like] young people, workers and the LGBTQ+
community, but you could believe Amisha, because you could see her
fight for herself. Anyone who would wage the battle that she waged
against cancer is someone I could trust. She will be greatly missed by
many people.”CLOSE FRIEND AND ACTIVIST ERICA BLAND said, “Amisha
led with a love that forever changed the city of Chicago and the world
through organizing. She had a fierce brilliance that challenged
systems of oppression, ultimately changed some and helped lay the
foundation for many fights to come. Her legacy is woven into the
fabric of the Chicago fight of working people.”LONGTIME AND ACTIVIST
MADELINE TALBOTT said, “In 2007, Grassroots Collaborative
hired Amisha to lead the organization. She made big changes,
bringing an unwavering commitment to racial and economic justice and a
strategy to include the grassroots members of the coalition’s
organizations in popular education trainings, allowing them to build
relationships across organizational lines. Amisha also brought her
delight in using art and making events fun to the organization,
creating a new dynamic in the organization that attracted more
participants and made more of an impact.CLOSE FRIEND MAYA
SCHENWAR said, “Amisha combined so many beautiful aspects of
humanity into one powerhouse spirit, charged with
bravery, creativity and light. She was generous—with resources, her
time, her mental capacity, her energy and most of all, with her love.
During the times I spent with her in the last month of her life,
when she was suffering hard, she still asked constantly about me, and
wasn’t interested in small talk. She wanted to know what was going
on deep down—the hard stuff—and offered her empathy and insights.
Amisha was fierce and steadfast in her commitment to connection,
always urging us to see each other in our full humanity, knowing that
through connection comes solidarity.”GRASSROOTS
COLLABORATIVE LEADERSHIP said, “Our hearts are broken. After
months of striving to beat the disease, she turned her amazing courage
toward facing the conclusion of her time with us. Our hearts are with
her wife, Neena, her family and the many, many people whom she loved
and who loved her back. She gave us many gifts to carry with
us.”Patel’s funeral will take place SATURDAY, MAY 2 AT NEW MOUNT
PILGRIM MISSIONARY BAPTIST CHURCH, 4301 W. WASHINGTON BLVD. Viewing
will be from 12-2 p.m. and the program from 2-4 p.m.Hemmady said in
her Facebook post announcing Patel’s death that they decided to hold
the funeral at this specific church because Patel and “her fellow
organizers held so many groundbreaking events there that changed the
course of our city.” All are welcome to attend.

The family has asked that in lieu of flowers, people should donate to
the Amisha Patel Arts & Organizing Fellowship
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a new program that was created to continue Patel’s legacy. The
fellowship will help support artists who make art for social
justice-focused grassroots movements.

Amisha Patel, Ayush Hemmady-Wright, Neena Hemmady, and Varsha
Hemmady-Wright. Photo courtesy of Hemmady

Amisha Patel and her parents, mother Kusum Patel and father Arvind
Patel . Photo courtesy of Neena Hemmady

* Amisha Patel
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* Chicago organizer
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* Obituary
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