Lennox Yearwood, Jr. is a minister and community activist who is also an influential member of political hip hop. Yearwood currently serves as president of the Hip Hop Caucus, a national nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that empowers young people to participate in elections, policymaking and service projects. Yearwood has led or been involved in a number of high-profile campaigns to engage young voters, as well as working on human rights issues in the Gulf Coast region after Hurricane Katrina. Early life and education Yearwood was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. He earned his undergraduate degree from the University of the District of Columbia in 1998 and received a M.Div. degree from Howard University in May 2002. Yearwood was the student government president at both schools and was issued an honorary doctorate from Saint Paul University in May 2011. He also served in the U.S. Air Force Reserve as an officer and chaplain. Early activism Yearwood was a co-creator of the 2004 campaign "Vote or Die" with Sean Combs. He was the Political and Grassroots Director for Russell Simmons' Hip Hop Summit in 2003 and 2004, and functioned as Senior Consultant to Jay Z's "Voice Your Choice" campaign. He served as a Senior Consultant for P. Diddy's Citizen Change, where he provided a 50-state strategy for engaging the hip hop generation in community-building dialogues. During the 2004 Presidential election, Yearwood, Russell Simmons, and Jonathan Lewis created the "Hip Hop Team Vote Bus Tour." Yearwood is also the founder of Hip Hop Voices, a project of Voices for Working Families (AFL-CIO). H.R. 2206 protest Yearwood and others protested the United States Senate passage of the U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Act, 2007 on April 26, 2007. Yearwood was arrested with thirteen other protesters in the Hart Senate Office Building Guantanamo Bay Yearwood organized "Shut It Down," a hip hop concert at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC, calling for the end of torture at the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp and for the camp's closure. The concert featured Dead Prez and several other hip hop artists. Amnesty International and the ACLU were partners in the event. Hip Hop Caucus Yearwood is the president and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus, founded September 11, 2004, on the premise that the hip hop generation is uniquely qualified to address human-rights for the 21st century. Since its founding, the Hip Hop Caucus