Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Appearing by Video

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, the Founder of the AHA Foundation, a Senior Fellow with the Future of Diplomacy Project at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at The Harvard Kennedy School, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and publishes on the Restoring the West Substack, where she promotes free and open discussion in pursuit of the truth and to protect Western values.

Hirsi Ali was born in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1969 and was brought up in a strict Muslim household and initially embraced the Islamic faith. At age five, Hirsi Ali underwent female genital mutilation.

In 1992, Hirsi Ali fled to the Netherlands to escape a forced marriage. She was given asylum, and in time citizenship. She quickly learned Dutch and later received her master’s degree in political science from the University of Leiden.

From 2003 to 2006, Hirsi Ali served as an elected member of the Dutch parliament. She resigned as a member of parliament in 2006 and moved to the US. In 2007, Hirsi Ali founded the AHA Foundation, a nonprofit organization committed to preserving, protecting, and promoting liberal freedoms and ideals.

In 2023, Hirsi Ali announced her conversion to Christianity after years of being an outspoken atheist. Her next book, Why I Am Now a Christian, is set to be published in 2027. She is the author of several books, including the bestselling Infidel (2007), Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now (2015), and Prey (2021).