Shenandoah Interviews State Senator Ghazala Hashmi

In 2019, Ghazala Hashmi, a former English professor, became the first ever Muslim and Indian American State Senator in Virginia. In another historic feat, she won the Democratic nomination for Lieutenant Governor in June 2025 and will appear on the ballot for the statewide election this coming November. Shenandoah’s Special Features Editor, Nadeen Kharputly, sat down with Senator Hashmi for a conversation about her early life, her career in education, her transition to a political career, and how literature has shaped her life—and her desire to make life better for her constituents.

This is an excerpt of the full conversation, which will be published in our Fall 2025 issue in December.

NK: You decided to run for office because you wanted to stand up for historically and systemically marginalized people. That's something that motivates a lot of people to pursue careers in politics and also in education, because education is one of the most socially and financially transformative forces in the world. How did your work as an educator prepare you for your political career?

GH: I think my work as a community college educator in particular prepared me for that. Previously, my only teaching experiences had been in these elite educational contexts, and I'd gone to grad school thinking I wanted to spend the rest of my life in a small private liberal arts college, and that that would be where I would be the happiest. I remember clearly one of my dissertation advisors admonishing me when he knew I was moving to Virginia; he said, “Just stay away from community colleges—that will be the death of your professional career.” And sadly, that was the thinking, especially at that time: that if you wanted to be a serious academic, you had to reach for the top schools. The goal was not to be an educator; it was to be a researcher and academician, and it took me a while to release myself from that thinking. The community college is where I really developed that passion for social justice concerns and the impact that government and state policy was having on the lives of my students.

Over the 20 years I was at Reynolds [Community College], I saw the state government pulling away tuition support, especially from community colleges, and so there was an increasing burden on my students to pay those costs, and I saw so many of my students struggling. They were only taking one class at a time, because that's all they could afford. They're working two jobs usually, they're taking care of children. One flat tire could cause a student to drop out for the whole semester—they didn't have $500. I had students who would become homeless in the middle of a semester. Many of our students were on food assistance programs. And so those levels of injustices that continue to create barriers for opportunity, for economic development were so massive.

And at the same time, I had so many students just telling me how much their being in school was impacting their children's lives—that their kids would see them sit and do homework, and they wanted to sit and do homework, like mom or dad. And that transformative impact of education, the generational impact of education, was so evident, and I knew that we could do better at the state level to support these students. And so that was a huge motivation for me to run, and it's been a huge factor in the kind of work that I do, the legislation that I carry, and continues to shape my perceptions of what state policy ought to be.

NK: That must have been a complete revolution in your perspective in terms of what even small changes can do to someone's life, and then the lives of their entire families.

GH: It's hugely gratifying. I'm humbled every time that I am in these spaces, it's so gratifying to be in a position where I can champion and hopefully move for legislation and for budget. That actually makes a real difference in the lives of people.

NK: I'm a big believer—you're probably a big believer, anyone reading Shenandoah is a big believer—that words have a life-changing impact on people, whether it's something that you read in a text or words that you impart to someone else. What are some of the most impactful words that you've read or heard?

GH: There are snippets of poetry and philosophy that I always return to. I think often of Ralph Waldo Emerson. He has these pithy little sayings which can seem to be sometimes trite, but when you think about them are so meaningful. The idea of being able to change and evolve and contradict yourself, I think, is so important, because that's part of human nature. And I'm not remembering the exact quotes from Emerson, but he gives us permission to be evolving in our character and our understanding and our approach to the world, and I think those are always so critically important.

NK: Are there any particular words that might resonate with the American public right now? Which words do you think are running through folks's minds at this moment in American life and politics?

GH: When I was on the campaign trail after the November [presidential] election, a lot of the groups that I was meeting with expressed great anxiety, fear, concern about what's happening in our country. But the two words that keep resonating recently now, and they're very simple words in some ways, but they're powerful as we're looking towards November's [upcoming gubernatorial] election [in Virginia]: hope and optimism. I am by nature an optimistic person. And so, despite the darkness of the times and the darkness of what's happening globally and in our own country, being able to hang on to—I don't want to call them shreds, but hang on to the threads of optimism, I think, is so critical and necessary because that's what builds resilience. And I think that's the word I really like: resilience. I do feel, as hard and challenging as this historic moment is, that there is resilience in this country. There's resilience in its people, and the goodness that I see in so many individuals is what I always hang my hope on. I like the word resilience, so that will be my word. I think we are a resilient humanity. And it's not just us as Americans, but we are a resilient humanity, and I think we will, as we have done, survive through very dark periods. And there's reason to continue to be hopeful for humanity.

NK: What was the last thing that you read that inspired you, or that is still simmering in your mind?

GH: I've been reading a lot of books on academic freedom and the challenges that are impacting our colleges and universities. And there are collections of essays on academic freedom that speak to the moment that we're in and what's confronting higher education in particular, and where we need to go. That will be an important focus for me this upcoming year, especially given what we've seen happening in Virginia, I'm hopeful that we will be able to reverse the attacks on our colleges and universities. We can't necessarily make changes at the national level. But at least in Virginia, we can protect the institutions that I do revere. I see our higher education spaces as sacred. They're as sacred to me as any institutions of faith. Libraries and colleges and universities are sacred spaces, and I will be working to protect those areas. And so the books that I've been reading are collections of essays. Basically, those have been really resonant on many levels.

This interview, and this excerpt in particular, have been edited for length and clarity.