Hanna Sharif-Kazemi is a Policy Manager at the Drug Policy Alliance’s Office of Federal Affairs. She leads DPA’s campaign to repeal a federal lifetime ban imposed on individuals convicted of a drug felony from receiving SNAP. In addition to her work on SNAP, Hanna manages the office’s portfolios on collateral consequences of convictions, harm reduction, and overdose prevention.
Previously, Hanna was a Policy Analyst and Program Manager at Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts, where she led an evaluation of Cook County’s drug courts and began the first drug court watching program in Illinois. While at Chicago Appleseed, Hanna also co-convened a coalition to end the use of civil forfeiture in Illinois and was an active member in other coalitions, including the Illinois Drug Policy Reform Coalition.
Hanna received her MSW from the University of Chicago. Hanna has also held positions at the UChicago Smart Decarceration Project and at the Federal Defender Program for the Northern District of Illinois. While at the Federal Defender Program, she provided counseling, case management, and mitigation support to both incarcerated individuals and those involved in a pretrial drug court program. Hanna received her B.S. from New York University in Applied Psychology and Art History.