Meet Grant Amjad Miller
native Utahn
Grant is Palestinian American. His mother is from the West Bank and his father is from Wisconsin. His family moved to Bryan Avenue in Salt Lake City when he was one year old.
Grant had deep roots growing up in Utah. He was a Junior Jazz basketball player in grade school. As a Jordan High Beetdigger, he was debate state champion in Student Congress. He graduated from Snow College cum laude where he studied art and communication.
Musician turned law student
Grant applied to law school in 2013 - and was rejected. While taking time to study to retake the LSAT, he joined folk band L’anarchiste as a trombone player and spent the year touring and recording. The band was City Weekly’s “Band of the Year” in 2013. Their album “Giant” achieved mainstream critical acclaim, including positive reviews from the Wall Street Journal and NPR’s Weekend Edition.
Grant still plays live music and is currently the trombonist for local ska bandThe Makeways.
dedication to legal service
In 2014, Grant was accepted to law school at the University of Utah. In between his studies, he dedicated his time to providing legal assistance in pro bono legal clinics. He drafted expungements for people who deserved a second chance and helped people with eviction and debt issues. He was elected president of the Student Bar Association and was the commencement speaker for his graduating class.
He still has his law school rejection letter framed next to his law degree.
Public Defender
The overwhelming majority of Utahns cannot afford an attorney if they needed one. After law school, Grant had a goal to offer the best legal service money couldn’t buy. He joined the public defender office Salt Lake City, where he still works today.
Focusing on rehabilitative and restorative justice, Grant has worked on hundreds upon hundreds of cases with people who live in poverty, which provided him with specific insights into Salt Lake’s homelessness crisis. Grant has helped countless Utahns connect to resources in order to address mental health, substance abuse, and housing issues.
He takes every case the court assigns to him, which are exclusively major crimes. An effective trial lawyer, he has tried almost every type of criminal matter, from traffic tickets to homicide.
community leader
In 2018, Grant became the director of the Utah chapter of Wills For Heroes, an organization that provides free estate plans for firefighters and police officers. He joined leadership on the Liberty Wells Community Council in 2020 where he served as a board member.
He became president of the Young Lawyer Division of the Utah State Bar in 2021, where he oversaw the administration of several free legal help clinics and provided scholarships for aspiring law students. He sat ex officio on the Utah State Bar Commission and represented Utah at the American Bar Association YLD assembly.
In 2023, Utah Business Magazine recognized him as one of their “40 Under 40” honorees.
He currently serves on the Judicial Conduct Commission and sits on the Board of Directors for the ACLU of Utah.
proud and dedicated husband
Grant is happily married to the love of his life Karly. As colleagues from law school and fellow attorneys, Grant proposed marriage after years of companionship. They had their wedding ceremony at the Utah Supreme Court in 2022. As a couple, they purchased their first home together in the heart of Salt Lake City.
State Representative
Grant was elected to the Utah State House of Representatives in 2024. He has established himself a pragmatic progressive, routinely passing bills that help Utah’s underserved communities. He successfully created law that reformed court fines, protected victims of domestic violence, and helped adults with disabilities find employment.
Grant confronted bills that targeted at our trans communities, introduced a Homeless Bill of Rights, and voted in solidarity with Utah’s labor unions.
Grant believes that we don’t have to accept the world as it is, but rather, work to make it what it should be. From the court house to the statehouse, he engages the system to level the playing field for all Utahns. A blue salmon against a red current, he has defied Utah’s political norms. He has shown that positive change is always possible.