Elise Hu

Deja Fox is 25 years old, and she already has a decade's worth of experience as a public figure and activist.

That's in big part thanks to social media.

Through sharing her youth activism, Deja grew a strong following that translated into a budding career in politics.

including becoming one of history's youngest presidential campaign strategists during Kamala Harris's 2024 campaign.

Now, Deja is challenging us to reimagine what our internet looks like and how to make social media a more inclusive space for everyone, including girls and women.

We sat down together at this year's TED conference to unpack how our online lives have moved offline and what that means.

And a quick note, this conversation was recorded in April 2025 while Deja was still running for Congress in a Democratic Party primary election for Arizona's 7th congressional district held in September.

The conversation mentions her run.

Well, Deja, congrats on your TED Talk.

Thank you.

To kick things off, I would love to know what it was like just preparing for the TED Talk, what surprised you along the way in this whole journey to winding up on stage.

Yeah, yeah.

Why do you think it is that teen girls so often get written off culturally as a source of power and innovation and intellect?

Well, some of it might be structural, too, right?

I mean, obviously, you're talking about kind of culturally the way that things are labeled and identified and spoken about and who gets to count and matter and who doesn't.

But also there's structural aspects of our online platforms, which is what your talk gets to, that can be quite difficult or unsafe spaces for women and girls.

Yeah.

And so you are advocating for alternate online spaces that are built by and for young women.

We'd love for you to just kind of expand on what that looks like and how an online space that is coming from and governed by a more women's perspective is different.

And there's also a lot of sameness too.