Pro Bono Opportunities / Law Firm Deferral Options

The Asian American Justice Center (formerly National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium) was founded in 1991 and its mission is to advance the human and civil rights of Asian Americans through advocacy, public policy, public education, and litigation.  AAJC is a national organization headquartered in Washington, DC and it has expertise in affirmative action, anti-Asian violence prevention/race relations, census, immigrant rights, immigration, language access, television diversity, and voting rights. The organization has three affiliates – the Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles, the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco, and the Asian American Institute in Chicago – through which its work is coordinated and executed.  AAJC’s expertise is widely acknowledged: in the media, by the public and lawmakers at the very highest tiers of government.  In the greater civil rights community, AAJC serves as the vice chair of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and as a principal in Americans for a Fair Chance, which is a consortium of six of America's leading civil rights organizations: AAJC, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc., the National Women's Law Center, and the National Partnership for Women and Families. 

AAJC is seeking three fellows to work in Washington DC to assist in the implementation of its national litigation program, health policy, and judicial nominations projects.    

National Litigation Program: Identify and vet potential cases; Build and utilize the expertise of the AAJC Attorney Advisory Committee; Research and build solid legal arguments; Coordinate litigation matters with AAJC affiliates; Find and coordinate a network of pro bono attorneys; Partner with these attorneys to advance cases; and Develop amicus briefs on other important litigation matters. 

Health Policy: Work on public policy issues related to the immigrant community from a legal perspective, with an emphasis on women and children; work in coalition with the Children’s Defense Fund, NAACP, and the National Council of La Raza to draft appropriate model legislation; participate and give briefings to the Senate Health Employment Labor and Pension Committee; Coordinate a national advocacy campaign to ensure those most vulnerable can access affordable and quality health care.

Judicial Nominations: Work in coalition with the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights judicial nominations taskforce; coordinate nominations and vettings with LCCR and the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association; Provide legal research on potential nominees; Advocate for qualified candidates on the hill; Provide briefings on qualified candidates to constituents.

Below are some additional links that provides additional information about AAJC:

·      About: http://www.advancingequality.org/about_us/

·      Comcast video coverage of AAJC: http://www.comcastcreative.com/video/AAJC_RC.wmv

·      Select briefs: http://www.advancingequality.org/litigation_briefs/

 For more information contact Vincent A. Eng at veng@advancingequality.org or at +1 202 296 2300, x121.

Opportunity in Los Angeles - Asian Pacific American Legal Center

The Asian Pacific American Legal Center of Southern California was founded in 1983 and is the nation's largest legal and advocacy organization serving Asian Americans.  APALC's mission is to advocate for civil rights, provide legal services and education and build coalitions to positively influence and impact Asian Americans and to create a more equitable and harmonious society.  APALC achieves its mission through direct services, impact litigation, policy advocacy and leadership development, and works on a broad range of issues spanning family law to housing, immigration to workers rights, voting rights to education equity.  Based in Los Angeles and Orange Counties, APALC also advocates in Sacramento through several joint legislative partnerships and in Washington DC through our national partner, Asian American Justice Center.  Throughout Southern California and statewide, APALC is highly regarded for its ability to work across lines of race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, etc. and has won many accolades for its work serving the poor and creating systemic change in laws and policies.  Both the current Executive Director and Litigation Director are past recipients of the MacArthur "Genius" Award and the Executive Director is also a recent recipient of the California State Bar's Loren Miller Legal Services Award. 

APALC has a number of potential opportunities for attorneys to engage in legal services, public policy advocacy or litigation on behalf of low-income Asian Americans, especially elderly or limited English speakers.  Identified opportunities exist in the following areas, dependent on applicant interest and experience:

Legal services (assisting individual clients with legal matters)

- Domestic violence-related (including family law and immigration)

- Eviction defense and other housing rights

Public policy

- Consumer rights

Depending on the project placement, attorneys will have opportunities to gain and improve legal skills, research and write legal and policy documents, engage in outreach and education to Asian American communities,  and advocate before elected officials and government agencies. 

For more information, please visit http://www.apalc.org or contact Karin Wang at kwang@apalc.org or +1 213 241 0234 or Rebecca Shea at rshea@apalc.org or +1 213 2310228.

Opportunity in Chicago - Asian American Institute

The Asian American Institute (AAI) is a pan-Asian, non-partisan, not for profit 501(c)(3) organization located in Chicago, Illinois, whose mission is to empower the Asian American community through advocacy, by utilizing coalition building, education, and research.  AAI was established in 1992 by a group of Asian American community activists, academic professionals, and business leaders in response to the need for this fast-growing population to develop consensus on a pan-Asian agenda among Chicago's diverse Asian American communities.  AAI’s programs include community organizing, leadership development, and legal advocacy.  Asian Americans are one of the fastest-growing populations in the United States.  In Illinois, this diverse and often over-looked community numbers over 617,000, according to the 2007 Census estimates. 

AAI is seeking a fellow to assist with legal work in the areas of voting rights, redistricting, and census issues.  This is an exciting time to work on such legal issues, as there will be several key elections taking place in the Chicago area in 2010 and 2011, as well as the 2010 United States Census.  The fellow will also assist AAI with researching and implementing other civil rights programs, including programs that focus on race relations, language access, hate crimes, and affirmative action.

For more information, please visit http://www.aaichicago.org or contact Ami Gandhi at ami@aaichicago.org or at +1 773 271 0899.

Opportunity in San Francisco - Asian Law Caucus

The Asian Law Caucus (ALC) is the nation’s oldest legal Asian American civil rights organization, founded in 1972.  Our mission is to promote, advance and represent the legal and civil rights of the Asian and Pacific Islander communities. Recognizing that social, economic, political and racial inequalities continue to exist in the United States, the Asian Law Caucus is committed to the pursuit of equality and justice for all sectors of our society with a specific focus directed toward addressing the needs of low-income Asian and Pacific Islanders.  We advance our mission through direct legal services, impact litigation, community organizing and education, and policy advocacy. One of the landmark cases for which we are recognized is the coram nobis decision of Fred Korematsu.  Led by a team of pro bono attorneys, ALC worked to overturn the World War II-era criminal conviction of Korematsu who defied the executive orders of Japanese American internment.  Currently, ALC’s main areas of practice are civil rights, housing, worker rights, immigrant rights, and juvenile justice.  

ALC is seeking a fellow to assist in the development of our taxi worker legal program.  The legal fellow would address the needs of the multi-ethnic taxi driver community in the following ways: 

·      Litigate impact cases with Caucus attorneys in state court, including investigation, complaint, discovery, taking and defending depositions, mediation and negotiations, pre-trial and trial work;

·      Engage in ongoing outreach to the taxi worker community;

·      Engage in city-wide policy advocacy with regard to health insurance for driver and a retirement plan for medallion holders;

·      Provide legal services to impacted individuals;

·      Identify and vet potential cases for litigation; and

·      Develop and coordinate pro bono attorney network.

For more information, please visit our website at www.asianlawcaucus.org, our blog at www.arcof72.com, or contact Christopher Punongbayan at chrisp@asianlawcaucus.org, +1 415 848 7723.