As the current regime turns away from curbing climate change and towards embracing increased carbon emissions, Gen Z is doing what it can to pick up the slack. Jamie Margolin is only 23 years old, but she has been an activist for the past 8+ years. Coming of age in the Trump era, she witnessed the systematic dismantling of environmental regulations and free reign given to petroleum and gas companies to extract fossil fuels in the cheapest way possible. The existential threat of climate change inspired Jamie to co-found Zero Hour, an international youth climate justice movement which aims to empower youth to lead the environmental justice narrative, as those who stand to bear the brunt of climate change. This organization has been going strong since 2017. Read on to learn more about climate justice leader Jamie Margolin!

Where are you based?
I haven’t been based in any one place lately. I was born in Los Angeles, I grew up in Seattle, and I went to University in New York City. Ever since I graduated I have been all over. I lived in Colombia for five months, and now I’m going to be back in New York for a bit. Who knows where my work will take me next.

You are Colombian-American. How does your Colombian heritage inform your views on the climate, nature, and activism?
Colombia is a very diverse country with many different ethnic groups with different subcultures. My family is from Bogota, the nations capital in the Andean region, and we a part of the racial majority known as “Mestizos” (people of mixed Indigenous and Spanish / Portuguese heritage). My grandma is the last member of the family who grew up living on a farm and off the land, so she has a lot of values of loving and protecting the land that I have absorbed. While we have no tribal affiliation, we do know the native side of our family comes from the Andes in and around Bogota, and there are certain foods, and traditions that come from that heritage. When we harvest from my family’s farm, my grandma will talk to the plants and trees and praise them for being so beautiful, for creating such great fruit and veggies.

However we are not the same as Indigenous people in the country who have preserved their languages and are actively protecting their lands from extraction. My family speaks Spanish and practices Catholicism, so a lot of those capitalist values imposed during colonization are also present and can clash with the values and understandings of the Indigenous people of the country who haven’t been colonized like we have. Mestizaje is complicated: We maintain some of the heritage and legacy of our Indigenous ancestors, while also carrying on the legacy of our Spanish and Portuguese ones.

There are many issues of racism in Colombia where Mestizos are on the wrong side of justice, looking down on and actively discriminating against Black and Indigenous Colombians. This has informed my activism in that I know that I walk a tightrope of privilege, where I exist between many worlds. I have internalized the values of respecting the earth and land that my grandmother demonstrates, but also existing as someone from a colonized background I am constantly learning and unlearning. I am always trying to learn more from Indigenous groups who have maintained their ancestral knowledge. My activism and art is dedicated to uplifting and defending the defenders: Indigenous groups who are humanity's last connection to ancestral knowledge that has been wiped in many parts of the world. That knowledge is the key to our survival.

What inspired you to get involved in activism?
The 2016 election was a trigger in my activism. Seeing Trump’s rise to power made me realize how our leaders weren’t going to take action on the climate crisis. The 2016 election opened my eyes to a lot of issues. Initially existential dread drew me to this issue (I was worried about what my life and future would look like with the climate crisis looming over my generation), but gradually I began to realize how climate justice is key to all justice.

Correctly solving climate change means dismantling all the systems of oppression that caused it in the first place.

I can’t pinpoint the first time I heard about climate change, there was never an ah-ha moment. As a young person, I am always asked and expected to plan for my future. “What are you going to be when you grow up” “what are you going to do with your life” — how am I supposed to plan and care about my future when my leaders aren’t doing the same, and instead leaving my generation and all future generations with a planet that is inhospitable and impossible to sustain civilization.

What inspired you to start Zero Hour? Can you tell us a bit about it?
I co-founded Zero Hour in the summer of 2017 along with several other amazing youth in the United States. I have been a climate justice activist locally in Seattle since 2016 but I only started my national work in late 2017.

Zero Hour is a movement that centers the voices of diverse youth in the conversation around climate and environmental justice. We are a youth-led movement creating entry points, training, and resources for new young activists and organizers (and adults who support our vision) wanting to take concrete action around climate change. Together, we are a movement of unstoppable youth organizing to protect our rights and access to the natural resources and a clean, safe, and healthy environment that will ensure a livable future where we not just survive, but flourish. We as an organization organize mobilizations, events and campaigns that work to change the national narrative on climate change and make the world and leaders listen to youth on this issue.

We’re called Zero Hour because it’s zero hour to act on climate change. I had a vision of youth all over the US and the world marching for urgent climate action since the first Women’s March back in January of 2017. At that time I was still fresh to the community organizing world, and was nervous to take on the enormous task of starting a mass movement. And so I suppressed that vision and continued to do local environmental organizing.

Then, the summer of 2017 happened. I was at a month long Political Speech and Communication course at Princeton University for high schoolers in July. It was the first time I had spent such a long time away from my family. I was on the other side of the country, surrounded by politically engaged high schoolers. By that time I had gained community organizing experience. That was also a summer full of natural disaster after natural disaster, and thick smog that covered Seattle thanks to stronger-than-usual wildfires up north in Canada, and Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.

That was when I finally decided to take the plunge. I had a social media mutual, Nadia Nazar, who was willing to take a leap of faith with me. Madeline Tew and Zanagee Artis also joined, who were friends from Princeton camp.

For a while, we did tons of visioning and brainstorming, struggling to find our footing.

Soon we brought on some adult mentors and we reached out to frontline communities who we knew had to be at the center of the movement, like some of the youth from the Standing Rock tribe who famously let the #NODAPL fight. They were super excited by the idea, and some of the youth, like Tokata Iron Eyes and Danny Grassrope, ended up speaking at The Youth Climate March in Washington DC on July 21st, 2018. Since then we’ve organized many actions, lobby days, protests, and have expanded into a full fledged organization. We are not a movement that happened overnight at all. It took grueling hours and hours every day of slow but gradual movement building, and it still does.

There are a number of other climate action groups, including youth-led ones. What makes Zero Hour different?
Well for one, we are still here. There was a boom of many youth led organizations being founded and then disbanded, and Zero Hour has stood the test of time. We have been here operating since 2017 and have evolved with the times. Right now we are less focused on mass mobilizations and more on stopping specific fossil fuel projects, working within the People vs. Fossil Fuels coalition. We still very much believe in the power of mass mobilization, it is just that now we have expanded our tactics. We have adapted as times have changed and the organization grew with us. Things are different now that we are in our twenties and not teenagers anymore.

What are some of Zero Hour’s greatest accomplishments in your view?
Our Youth Climate Marches of 2018 that laid the groundwork for the school strike for climate movement and helped shape the modern youth climate movement as we know it today is one of our greatest accomplishments. I am also very proud of our “Getting to the roots” campaign, an educational program we launched to talk about the systems of oppression at the root of the climate crisis, going beyond the understanding of how the industrial revolution caused climate change and understanding the underlying causes that got us here (Colonialism, capitalism, racism, patriarchy.) Overall, I think our biggest accomplishment is our longevity and staying power. Times change, our leadership shifts as new members take on the mantle of keeping the organization going, but we are always keeping Zero Hour alive: still here organizing, still pushing forward, still educating and mobilizing.

Your three other co-founders are also very impressive. What is your relationship with them like? How did you three connect?
We are friends, and we go way back. It’s like a built in chosen family. Zanagee and Madeline I met and then recruited to start Zero Hour with me at a Princeton University political advocacy summer camp. Nadia I met online because she read an article about climate change I published, and reached out to me on Instagram. We became internet friends and she came in as a cofounder, designing our logo and creating our branding and art for the organization. We all grew up together, from young teenagers to people in our twenties, and it is really special to have a built in family. Sometime we’ll hang out and do things that have nothing to do with Zero Hour, just there for each other as human beings. Natalie Mebane, our main adult mentor, now our Chief Program Officer, is like a big sister to me, and we work on climate and hang out as a chosen family. I have fond memories of Natalie, Nadia and I hiking in the woods together, spending time in nature we fight so hard to protect. Recently we had a Barbeque at the home of our Chief Program Officer who hosted us along with Nadia, our current Executive Director Jamie Minden, and other former Zero Hour members.

You identify as Jewish, Latina, and lesbian. How do these intersectional identities inform the work you do?
My mom is from Colombia and my dad is a Jewish American, and I am a lesbian. They inform the work I do because I have no control over them: it is simply the family I was born in and the natural orientation of how I love. People all over the world are targeted for simply being who they are. Criminalized for how they look, or for simply being Indigenous to their own land. I live at the intersection of many identities but also many privileges, and I am determined to use those privileges to fight for those more targeted than me.

My Jewish identity has informed my fight for justice for Palestine, because I grew up brainwashed in a Zionist Hebrew school system run by my synagogue. I never did “birthright” (no matter how much the staff of the synagogue tried to shove it down our throats) because Israel always felt off to me. When I was under 13 going to Hebrew school after my regular school, I didn’t yet know everything I know now about the theft of Palestinian land and abuse and murder of the people. But what I did have was a gut feeling this thing that was being constantly advertised to me wasn’t what it seemed.

When I educated myself more about Palestine, my suspicion of Israel turned into a full on rage at everyone who had ever lied to me saying that it was “the homeland of the Jewish people” and somehow my “birthright” even though my father’s ancestors are from Eastern Europe. Now I feel especially responsible for advocating for Palestinian liberation and debunking myths and misinformation, because I was raised to be brainwashed into zionism. Both myself and my father both broke out of that conditioning and have now pledged never to set foot in a synagogue again unless it is explicitly anti-zionist.

You have a book, Youth to Power, about youth organizing for climate action. How do you see that as an extension of your activism and what kind of impact do you hope it will make?
Youth To Power is a guidebook of all the things I wished someone had taught me when I first got involved in organizing. It is my love letter to the next generation of activists, including everything that I learned the hard way through building and running Zero Hour, and learning from other activists and organizers. It is an extension of my activism because it is my way of sharing all that I learned through trial and error to others so that they can use those tools and experiences to create change. I hope that people who read the book (people of any age) use the information to take their own action and make an impact in their own circles. I do want to write a second book, because I wrote Youth To Power when I was 17, and I am a much different person with much more experience and knowledge at 23. I am still synthesizing and marinating on what exactly it is I have to say to the world next. I have so many thoughts and reflections to share I get overwhelmed on where to even begin. The world and me as a person have changed so much since my first book, so I am still figuring out what I want to say next.

Why is it so important that young people get involved with activism?
All generations are needed in activism. Intergenerational organizing is crucial. Without the energy and drive and perspective of young people, movements become stale and lose momentum. Without the wisdom and guidance of older people, movements are all energy, no strategy, and can burn bright but then burn out just as quickly, because there is no underlying structure and strategy forged by experience to keep them going. Intergenerational movements are the key to our success.

You are also involved in the creation of PELEA. Can you tell us about this short film and your involvement? Where can we watch it?
I am the writer and director of “Pelea”, the debut film of a new indie animation studio I founded by the same name, “Pelea Animation.” Pelea means “fight” in Spanish. At Pelea Animation, we believe in the power of storytelling to challenge oppression and inspire change. Our debut animated short film, "Pelea," brings this mission to life. Set in the fictional nation of Vivencia, a South American country facing a violent coup for its oil resources, the story follows the daughter of the president as she witnesses the uprising of her people against foreign extraction. Blending steampunk science with real-world themes of resistance to imperialism and land defence, "Pelea" is a bold, visually striking tale of rebellion in the face of colonization. Right now I am in the process of working with a team of animators on a teaser for the short film, which will be 2D traditional hand drawn animation. I am very excited about what we are creating, the team I have put together is full of talented artists who I am honored to be bringing this vision to life with. The teaser will be released on Youtube, and the full short film will be released at film festivals before general release. I am so excited for the world to see what we have been cooking up.

A lot of activists are saying that the left needs to take as much time as it needs to rest and reset after the win of Trump in November. Do you agree? How should progressives be handling the next four years?
While we are resting and re-setting, they are taking swift action to roll back environmental and human rights protections, undo decades of progress, and spread fascism. The “rest is resistance” thing is valid within a certain context, but if you are just resting and not resisting, then that’s not activism that’s just finding a way to make your coping mechanisms seem progressive. Of course burnout is real, but we can’t be delusional. The Trump administration is a fascist one, and if we stay too focused on “self care” and not actually battling the human and environmental rights abuses, we are handing the country to fascism on a silver platter.

It has been a crazy past few years, and we suspect at least four more. How do you stay positive?
I am not the kind of person who will be delusionally positive when the world around me is crumbling. But despair is also unhelpful, because it keeps us frozen and unable to act. I don’t see a reason for positivity when the world has given me no reason to feel that way. I see the genocide in Gaza, and the genocides and human rights abuses all over the world and I just don’t feel hopeful. A hopeful world would have been one that stepped in to intervene and save the people of Palestine instead of watching them die through our screens for the past several years. I am under no illusion that I live in a fair or just world. However if I feel that pain every second of every day I will collapse under it. So I replace positivity with resilience and strategic rests and respite from the world. I will hang out with friends and community. It sounds cliche but sometimes things are cliche because they are true: community is the antidote to hopelessness. Action within community is our only hope.

What is your motto in life?
“Just keep swimming.” It’s what Dory says in Finding Nemo, it sounds cheesy, but it’s simple and powerful. There are moments where I feel so overwhelmed and I don’t see a way forward, but I just keep swimming. I keep going even if I don’t know how or even if I can’t see that far ahead. I keep putting one foot in front of the other, and so far, that motto hasn’t failed me.

Where can we find out more about you?
Pelea Animation will be launching a website soon at: peleaanimation.com. Zero Hour’s website is thisiszerohour.org. You can follow Pelea Animation at @peleaanimation on instagram, twitter, Linkedin and Bluesky. You can follow Zero Hour at @thisiszerohour on instagram, linkedin, facebook, tiktok, and twitter. My social media is @jamie_s_margolin on instagram, @Jamie_Margolin on twitter, Jamie Sarai Margolin on YouTube, and just my name for any other socials.

Jamie Margolin, Intersectional Activist