Brother Ali

Brother Ali, born Jason Douglas Newman in Madison, Wisconsin, on 30 July 1977, is an American rapper, producer and community activist, a member of the Rhymesayers Entertainment hip-hop collective. ¹ He has released eleven albums, among them The Undisputed Truth (2007), Us (2009) and Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color (2012). ¹ He converted to Islam at the age of 15. ¹

Ali was born in Madison and has albinism; his family moved to Michigan for a few years and then settled in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1992, and he attended Robbinsdale Cooper High School in New Hope. ¹ He began rapping at the age of eight, and has named Rakim, Chuck D and KRS-One as early influences. ¹ His albums The Undisputed Truth (2007), Us (2009) and Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color (2012) charted on the Billboard 200 and were favourably received by critics, and he continued with All the Beauty in This Whole Life (2017), Secrets & Escapes (2019), Love & Service (2024) and Satisfied Soul (2025). ¹ He performed on American late-night television, including The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson in 2007 and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in 2009. ¹

His best-known works include The Undisputed Truth (2007), Us (2009) and Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color (2012), all of which charted on the US Billboard 200. ¹ His later albums include All the Beauty in This Whole Life (2017), Secrets & Escapes (2019), Love & Service (2024) — which contains "The Collapse", a song about Gaza — and Satisfied Soul (2025). ¹

This section sets out different positions as reported in the sources. It is not a verdict by the museum.

His faith as the sources state it. The article's Religion section states that he converted to Islam at age 15 and followed Imam Warith Deen Mohammed, and that during this time he joined a student study tour to Malaysia exploring how a more liberal Islamic society could coexist with other religions, citing NPR. ¹ He credits his conversion to KRS-One, who assigned him The Autobiography of Malcolm X: "KRS-ONE was actually the one who told me I should read Malcolm X... I read it, and that's what led to me becoming a Muslim." ¹ Following a movement's leader is not the naming of a legal school, and no source names a madhhab for him; Wikidata gives only Islam generically. ² His record therefore carries his faith as unknown, with the attestations recorded verbatim. ¹

Palestine advocacy and its cost. The article describes him as a long-standing advocate for Palestinian liberation who speaks out against Israeli actions in Gaza and the West Bank. ¹ After October 2023 he became more vocal, and he says this led to professional backlash: his social-media reach was shadow-banned, a distribution company cancelled the deal for his 2024 album Love & Service, and he went a year without a single paid show for the first time in his career — a blackout he links directly to "insisting on talking about the Palestinians". ¹

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