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Khalil was born in 1984 on Mount Sinjar, Iraq, where his and other Yazidi families took refuge during the Iran-Iraq war. Four years later, when his father was captured by the Iraqi Army and managed to escape, the family fled to a Syrian refugee camp.

He would spend the next 11 of his 15 years there, living in tents, his family struggling to meet their basic needs: warmth in the winter, food on the table. But there were good things, too, he said, a diverse group of people he grew up with, a father who played a string instrument called a saz, a way for him to pass on the Yazidi stories, their culture and history to a younger generation.

That stuck with Khalil, came with him to the United States in 1999, when several countries began resettling the Syrian refugees.

He and his family settled in Buffalo, New York, living in a dangerous part of the city, he said, full of drugs and gangs. But he made friends. He was able to go to school. He became a musician in his own right. And he lived above a barbershop.

That sparked an interest, and after a stint in college he went to school to learn the trade, then opened his own barbershop in Buffalo. Fluent in three languages, he began interpreting for hospitals, courts and schools.

In 2010, his family moved to Lincoln, drawn by other Yazidis who had settled here and liked it, joining what would become home to more Yazidis than any other city in the United States.

In Lincoln, he earned a degree as a certified nurse assistant, continued his work as an interpreter, earned an associates degree in business, started an international youth soccer club and opened a barber shop called Golden Scissors.

And the shop on the corner of 31st and Holdrege with blue trim around the large windows became more than a place to cut hair, it became a place for friends and musicians to gather.

“I do a lot of music events,” he said. “And a lot of it is about bringing people together. That’s my purpose with music.”

But there was one thing Khalil had never done in his 25 years in the United States — 18 of them as a U.S. citizen.

“I’d never in my life voted,” he said.

Until Tuesday.

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He’d never considered voting, he said, because he — like many refugees — came from a place where people didn’t trust the government, where dissent or disagreement or anything having to do with politics was dangerous.

Several things happened that changed his mind.

His music played a part.

A filmmaker connected to the Norman Lear Center at the University of Southern California doing a series on music as a way to bridge cultural and political divisions found Khalil and did a 20-minute documentary on the music being made in his barbershop and around Lincoln.

In August, the Mary Riepma Ross Media Arts Center screened the documentary with a panel discussion that included Khalil.

Lancaster County Commissioner Christa Yoakum was there and introduced herself. She encouraged Khalil to participate in MyCity Academy offered by the Lincoln Commission on Human Rights. The six-week program teaches community members about local government and encourages civic involvement.

He signed up, and then was asked to perform and MC an event at Lincoln Welcoming Week, a celebration of Lincoln’s cultural diversity. As part of that, he attended a citizenship ceremony.

The words he heard resonated.

“I was inspired when listening to the speech about how you have the right to vote — and I began to think that I’d never bothered to learn how to vote.”

Khalill asked Yoakum, who was instrumental in getting MyCity Academy started, if she could help.

She explained the process, explained the ballot, and he decided to do the same.

“From my barbershop, I started providing the same information to other people,” he said.

He researched the issues, told others how they could do the same — and took 20 people who’d never voted before to register.

Yoakum didn’t tell him how to vote, nor did he tell those he convinced to register. He did tell them how they could learn about the issues, and did the work himself.

“Just being convinced that I should vote — once I made that decision I was eager to learn more,” he said.

On Tuesday, those he’d helped register to vote gathered at the barbershop, then headed to the polls.

He thinks local elections are particularly important — voting for those who most directly impact the city, county and state. He struggled with the presidential race because of the rhetoric on both sides.

He doesn’t want to say how he voted, but he could see both sides of the immigration debate, he said. He spent many years waiting to be admitted to the United States, but he knows how much it means to people from other countries to come here.

“It would be hard for me to be against bringing more refugees here because that just wouldn’t make sense,” he said. “I’d never be against another person who would want to come here to make a new life.”

He’s talked to a lot of people sitting in his barber chair, he said, and they didn’t all vote for the same people but he didn’t see the division he’s read about.

“I haven’t witnessed or seen anything like that,” he said. “You vote for who you vote for, then it’s another day.”

Not everyone he helped register was new to the country — some had lived here all their lives, but didn’t vote because they didn’t think it would matter.

Khalil — who left his precinct Tuesday after donning an “I voted today” sticker — respectfully disagrees. 

“I feel for the first time, you have a feeling like you have a voice, you get a sense of being part of the community,” he said.