Meet Sheikh
An Immigrant’s Story
Sheikh Rahman’s story is an immigrant’s American dream.
A member of a prominent political family, he grew up in relative wealth in his birth country of Bangladesh — then known as East Pakistan. Rahman even had someone to carry his books to school.
However, everything changed when his beloved country was ravaged by the Bangladesh Liberation War for independence in 1971. Millions of people fled the violence, and at age 13, Rahman himself was kidnapped at gunpoint as a prisoner of war. In 1972, America opened its first embassy in Bangladesh, and Rahman’s American dream then took off.
After finishing high school, Sheikh arrived in America on January 7, 1981, in order to attend Central Piedmont Community College. Though he was the son of high-ranking government officials in his birth country, Rahman took a job as a dishwasher in a North Carolina restaurant while making $3.35 per hour to help pay for college and to perfect his English.
Rahman arrived at the height of the Iranian hostage crisis, and he too soon felt the sting of xenophobia and racism. But Rahman persevered, winning friends with his work ethic and intelligence. In 1995, after a 14-year process, Sheikh Rahman became a U.S. citizen and finally finished his undergraduate degree in Economics & Global Studies at the University of Georgia, where he was elected as Student Senator and President of the Global Studies Association
Rahman worked his way up the ladder of the restaurant industry, from dishwasher to restaurant manager to corporate executive at Pizza Hut.
He made an entrepreneurial leap from restaurants to real estate and now manages rental properties across the state.
From the moment he stepped foot on American soil, Rahman was involved in local politics. A college friend invited him to work on a political campaign for Charlotte’s Mayor, Eddie Knox, who was running for Governor. He continued to work on political campaigns but never thought of running for office himself, until he saw a man with a “funny name,” educated in Indonesia, who then became President of the United States: Barack Obama.
After 2008, Rahman became heavily involved in politics, joining the NAACP, National Action Network, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Democratic Party of Georgia. In addition to serving as an active member of the Labor, Asian-American and LGBT caucuses, he is a SuperDelegate for the State of Georgia. He also serves as an advisor to the Alliance of South Asian American Labor.
Sheikh Rahman is the first immigrant ever elected to the Georgia Senate, where he brings his wealth of experience as an entrepreneur and first-generation American to the table and makes sure everyone in Gwinnett is well heard. He is also the first Asian-American elected to the State Senate, as well as the first Muslim State Senator.
Senator Rahman has co-sponsored ten bills that have been signed into law, including legislation on human trafficking, stalking, veterans’ issues and food insecurity. He has been a leading voice on maintaining local control of elections in Gwinnett County, and a strong advocate for public education. He received the Rising Environmental Leader Award from the National Council of Environmental Legislators and was named one of Atlanta’s 500 Most Powerful Leaders. He now serves on the Democratic National Executive Committee, the first Muslim in the United States to be elected to that role.
