“I invested countless hours advocating for gun violence prevention and disability rights across the nation. As my voice grew locally and nationally, I was encouraged to run for elected office – and I did.”
Representative Jennifer Longdon on thriving after her traumatic spinal cord injury, advocating for her community, and representing the people of Arizona.
“On November 15, 2004, my fiancé and I had just returned from our dream trip to Fiji. We were on our way to pick up drive-through tacos for dinner when five shots rang out – changing the trajectory of our lives in an instant. My fiancé was shot in the head, severing his optic and olfactory nerves. He now lives with a traumatic brain injury, and I was paralyzed by the last bullet fired,” Representative Jennifer Longdon casually explained, clearly having recounted these details more times than she can count.
Today, you can find Representative Longdon rolling on the floor of the Arizona House of Representatives or in meetings to push forward policies for the benefit of all Arizonans before she drives her big truck home to watch hockey, drink wine, and hang out with her two very large dogs: Kuma and Porter.
However, life after her injury was not always so easy. “While I lay in a coma, my health insurance company canceled my insurance coverage and, when I woke up, I confronted homelessness and poverty head-on,” Representative Longdon recounted. “While undergoing physical and financial recovery, I saw how easily someone can fall through the cracks, and quickly learned the accessibility barriers that persist today.”
After her recovery in the hospital, Representative Longdon returned to living in the community and began working with local leaders at City Hall to advocate for accessibility and dismantle barriers that she encountered as a newly disabled person. Her advocacy resulted in real change, and these victories helped Representative Longdon to gain more confidence, and she found her voice on disability rights growing.
She also began working on issues of equity and fairness to improve the lives of all people in her community. One of her first actions was to organize 14,000 volunteer hours out of her home to pass the Affordable Health Care Act. Her community organizing did not end there either - “I invested countless hours advocating for gun violence prevention and disability rights across the nation,” Representative Longdon shared. “As my voice grew locally and nationally, I was encouraged to run for elected office – and I did.”
In 2018, Representative Longdon ran for and was elected to the Arizona House of Representatives, and after her election, she was appointed to chair the Ad Hoc Committee on Abuse and Neglect of Vulnerable Adults, becoming the first Democrat appointed to chair such a committee in more than 50 years. That work has already produced laws that increase protections for people living in care facilities, and several additional bills are currently pending.
Representative Longdon demonstrated that she is a capable leader who is well-respected by her colleagues, and after she was re-elected in 2020, she was elected by her peers in the Arizona House to serve as Assistant Democratic Leader. Under her leadership, 17 bills introduced by Democrats were signed into law in 2021– more than in the last six years combined! Moreover, three of Representative Longdon’s bills centered on improving the lives of people with disabilities and benefiting all Arizonans have been signed into law.