Meet Austin Edwards
Civil rights leader.
Community advocate.
Lawyer for the people.
Austin Edwards is a civil rights leader and community advocate who has spent his career fighting for racial and economic justice. A son of Trenton and lawyer for the people, Austin is running for Mayor to clean up City Hall and make Trenton work for all of us.
Austin grew up in a union household on Rutherford Ave. When his family lost their home in the Great Recession, he saw firsthand what happens when our government abandons working-class people. Since then, he’s dedicated his life to fixing broken systems as a Howard-trained attorney.
As Deputy Attorney General for the State of New Jersey, Austin fought public corruption, spearheaded landmark criminal justice reforms, and wrote the Immigrant Trust Directive to protect our communities from ICE. He then went on to lead campaigns to expand voting rights and re-entry services at Salvation and Social Justice, the state’s leading racial justice policy organization.
At home, Austin served as President of the Trenton NAACP where he worked to expose widespread police misconduct and helped expunge more than 600 criminal records so Trenton residents get a second chance. He currently serves as a member of the Trenton School Board and the Chair of the Trenton Downtown Association.
Now, Austin’s running for Mayor to bring good-paying jobs to the city, freeze the rent and bring down the cost of housing, stop crime before it starts, and clean up City Hall.
Why I'm Running
Trenton raised me. Trenton made me.
But the Trenton we were, and the Trenton we can be, has never felt so far away.
As a kid, you’re not supposed to notice the problems adults are going through. But growing up here, I saw that things weren’t good even when I was little.
You walk past boarded up homes, or a park your parents tell you not to go to, or you hear gunshots in the distance, and there’s that pit in your stomach that forms because you know something just isn’t right.
A lot of kids in Trenton know this feeling. And it got worse as I got older.
The community stopped throwing block parties because the streets stopped being safe. After Mercer Hospital shut down, one of my best friends died of a heart condition. Then my parents lost our house in the Great Recession, and for a few years, we were homeless.
I’ll never forget that.
But here’s the thing: These weren’t personal failures. These were policy failures.
And they didn’t just fail my family then — they fail Trenton to this day.
So I dedicated my career to fighting back.
In the Attorney General’s office, I fought corruption at every level, taking on public officials who abused their power and stole millions of dollars from taxpayers
When it was time to stop Trump, I wrote the Immigrant Trust Directive to protect our immigrant neighbors from ICE.
And right here in Trenton as President of the local NAACP, I worked with community leaders to expose decades of police abuse. We fought back, and we expunged more than 600 criminal records — because everyone deserves a second chance.
And so does Trenton.
That’s what I’m running for Mayor to deliver. Here’s how we’ll do it:
We’ll bring new jobs into Trenton and make sure those businesses are hiring Trenton residents First, so all our neighbors have a fair shot.
We’re gonna freeze the rent and turn our abandoned properties into affordable homes.
And we’re going to keep Trenton safe by stopping crime before it starts, expanding our community street teams and doubling the amount of summer jobs for Trenton youth.
This is our chance to finally transform City Hall into the People’s House it was always meant to be, with real transparency and accountability.
And if you believe in Trenton’s future as much as I do — if you know, in your bones, that a change is gonna come, and you’re ready to fight for it the way I am — join us. Make calls, knock doors, tell your friends.
Let’s win the Trenton we deserve.
Join the movement to put Trenton First
This is a people-powered campaign — sign up to help us get out the vote!