Anisah Sabur
Founder and CEO of AAS Empowerment LLC
Anisah is a directly impacted woman of color, who has held serval leadership roles in coalitions and campaigns to dismantle the criminal legal system in New York State. She currently holds a position as Founder and CEO of AAS Empowerment LLC, she leads directly impacted women in organizing and empowers them to use their voice in advocacy. Anisah is currently the National Coordinator for the Unlock the Box Campaign, where she provides technical assistance to 23 states working to end solitary confinement in state and federal facilities. She is also volunteering to manage and organize the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women & Girls.
Anisah formerly coordinated several campaigns and coalitions across New York City and the State, just to name a few: Campaigns Against Isolated Confinement (CAIC) People’s Campaign for Parole Justice (PCPJ) Coalition for Women Prisoners (CWP) Campaign to Move to End Violence against Women (MEV)
Anisah formerly Coordinated for the Coalition of Women Prisoners at STEPS to End Family Violence’s Centering Survivor’s Advocacy Project. In her role, she built the coalition’s capacity throughout communities impacted by violence and the legal system and supported impacted women & girls in leadership roles, with legislative advocacy. Passing the DVSJA in 2019.
Before joining STEPS, Anisah held the position of Project Associate for the Correctional
Association’s (CANY) Women in Prison Project, a position she has held since 2014. As Project Associate, Anisah engaged in prison monitoring and policy advocacy, worked on legislative campaigns, coordinated the Coalition for Women Prisoners, and conducted community outreach and public education activities. Anisah is a long-standing member of the Coalition for Women
Prisoners and the former co-chair of the Coalition’s Re-Entry and Conditions of Confinement Committee.
Before joining the CANY, Anisah worked at the Center for Court Innovation’s Harlem Community Justice Center as a Case Manager. She also held the position of Parole Reentry Court Family Engagement Coordinator. She has an Associate Degree in Liberal Arts from LaGuardia Community College and plans to continue her education in public policy.
Anisah is currently a member of the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls; working in collaboration with other formerly incarcerated professional women and girls to challenge the criminal legal system to treat women more humanely by not using incarceration as the answer to our social and economic injustices faced in our communities.
Anisah has spent eight years as a lead organizer in the HALT-Solitary Campaign, until getting the legislation passed, in 2020 and continues to work in coalition on criminal justice reform and conditions to support incarcerated women and girls.
Anisah sat on the Advisory Committees for the Novo’s Foundation Women’s Building from 2016-2020. The Women’s Building is an old women’s prison that was being transformed into the Women’s Building of resources and safe spaces for women and girls.
Anisah sat on the New York Women’s Foundation Justice Advisory Committee, from 2019 -2023 as the Justice Fund Advisory member which helped to fund organizations that work on systemic change in NYC surrounding the campaign to close the women’s jail at Rikers Island.
Anisah also sits on the North Star Fund’s Community Funding Committee, where she reviews grant applications for the funders. As a member of all the foundation’s advisory committees, Anisah uses her lived experience and her experience working on criminal justice reform to help shape what could become the repurposing of prisons and jails for women and girls along with funding for the organization in NYC and NYS.
Anisah is also an alumnus of the Move to End Violence’s fourth cohort and has been engaging with movement makers from across the globe to end violence against women and girls. In 2020 Anisah joined the Survivors Justice Project, which tracks and supports individuals with the opportunity to use the Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act Law, which she led the advocacy for the new law.
In 2022 Anisah was invited to advise a group of music executives; The Universal Music Group Task Force seeks guidance and direction from individuals close to the solutions of the problem. Staying focused on communities of color that are impacted by lack of access to healthcare, housing, mental treatment, and justice.
Outside of her activism, Anisah holds a Board of Director position with Tools & Tiara- a nonprofit organization teaching young women & girls the construction trade, empowerment, and self-sufficiency through trades work.
Anisah founded the AAS Empowerment LLC which is her own LLC where she engages individuals, organizations & campaigns on power building and social justice reforms & activism.
She is an Activist, Advocate, and an Abolitionist.