Amika Mota

Amika Mota is a nationally respected movement strategist and formerly incarcerated leader with more than two decades of experience translating lived experience into statewide policy, coalition strategy, and systems change. Her commitment to reproductive justice, healing justice, and grassroots power-building is rooted in direct experience; during her incarceration, she advocated alongside women inside as a jailhouse lawyer, paralegal, firefighter, and mentor. 

Amika began organizing as a teen mother and midwife and has since built a strong record of community organizing, leadership development, and policy advocacy led by systems-impacted women. She has held senior policy and movement leadership roles across California, including serving as Policy Director at Young Women’s Freedom Center and Executive Director of Sister Warriors, where she co-founded a statewide coalition, advancing legislation, grassroots organizing, and political education for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women and gender-expansive people. She has been instrumental in advancing key legislation protecting incarcerated survivors of sexual assault and gender-based violence, and is an active voice in public discourse around incarceration.

In her role as Senior Vice President of Strategy & Policy, Amika leads the advancement of the Sister Warriors Freedom Charter through statewide policy strategy, building coalitions, and cultivating high-level partnerships. She collaborates with organizational leaders, policymakers, and funders to embed principles of freedom, equity, and economic power into law, practice, and political systems. A key aspect of her work is strengthening and expanding these efforts through the Sister Warriors Action Fund.