“Being open about myself and my experiences shows people that their secular government has secular members who will prioritize the needs of the people. And for the people who are nonreligious, especially the youth who need our support, my openness about not being religious demonstrates that they have an advocate at the legislature, and that they can be their authentic selves.”ecause I’m afraid of what may or may not happen in some sort of afterlife, or to please a higher power.”
Representative Chaichi was elected to the Oregon House of Representatives in 2023. She serves as Vice Chair House Committee on Gambling Regulation and she serves on the Judiciary Committee and Ways and Means Subcommittee on General Government.
A lifelong resident of Beaverton, she first got involved in human rights issues when she joined Amnesty International while attending Beaverton High School. Her work with the organization inspired her to study criminal justice and political science in college. Chaichi earned her Bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and political science from Seattle University, and then went on to earn her Master’s of Professional Studies in paralegal studies from George Washington University.
In 2014, she got more deeply involved in politics and was appointed to the Beaverton Human Rights Advisory Commission (HRAC), where she served for six years. Seeking to make a bigger impact on human rights is what led her to run for (and win) public office in her district.
Sarah Levin: What motivated you to run for office?
Rep. Chaichi: Because I value people, striving to overcome human suffering and indignity motivates my social and political work. In our world of instability, inequality, and intolerance, we are responsible for whether our neighbors, near and far, are treated with the inherent dignity we all deserve, regardless of how we identify ourselves. That includes race, gender, sexual orientation, level of ability, economic status, and, of course, religion or being nonreligious.
Our current systems still produce the inequities that I have spent my adult life working to overcome. As children, many of us were taught that hard work and resilience would be enough to build stability and success for ourselves. Yet our economic and political systems retain the same mechanisms that have oppressed people for centuries, despite the promises we have told and been told about freedom.
A decade ago I was appointed to the Beaverton Human Rights Advisory Commission (HRAC). My time serving on HRAC gave me a chance to examine some of our local issues with human rights closely, but an “advisory commission” position came with limited power to impact those issues. So I got involved everywhere I could to make a difference. I started attending political meetings, joined organizations, hit the pavement for candidates, and protested in the streets. When the opportunity to run for a seat in the state legislature came up, the chance to leverage my impact ultimately swayed me to get involved in this capacity.
State Representative Farrah Chaichi identifies as an atheist. This article was originally published as part of the Representation Matters series in The Humanist magazine, a publication of the American Humanist Association. Continue reading the full interview here.
Rep. Chaichi was re-elected in 2024 to a two-year term. This is her second term.
You can view all secular elected officials currently serving across the nation on The Secular Vote’s map of secular elected officials here.
