Dr. Farid Senzai is the founder and president of Afghan Relief and serves on the Board of Directors. He is a native of Afghanistan and is committed to helping the most vulnerable population in his home country. Dr. Senzai is also a professor of political science and international relations at Santa Clara University where he teaches courses on U.S. foreign policy and Middle East politics. Prior to starting Afghan Relief, Dr. Senzai was the founder and president of the Center for Global Policy (CGP), a think tank in Washington DC that focuses on U.S. relations with the Muslim world.

Dr. Senzai was previously a co-founder and the director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU), where he conducted extensive research projects on Muslims in America. Prior to that, he was a research associate at the Brookings Institution and a research analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is on the board of advisers at The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life and a former board member at the Central Asia Institute.

Dr. Senzai received his Master of Arts in international affairs from Columbia University and Ph.D. in politics and international relations from Oxford University.