Judith Olans Brown Forum: Practitioner-in-Residence – Brigitte Amiri ’99

Brigitte Amiri ’99, deputy director at the ACLU’s Reproductive Freedom Project and one of the nation’s leading litigators for reproductive freedom, has been named by Northeastern Law’s Judith Olans Brown Forum for Women in the Law as its Practitioner-in-Residence for 2022. Amiri will visit the law school for three days, from November 16 to November 18, 2022.

While in residence at Northeastern, Amiri will share comments and insights about her high-profile cases, including successfully advocating for a pregnant teenage immigrant who was barred from accessing abortion services during the Trump administration, and her efforts in the wake of the Dobbs decision, including a lawsuit in Kentucky seeking to block two abortion bans by asserting the Kentucky Constitution protects the right to privacy and bodily autonomy.

Amiri’s visit will include class lectures, meetings with groups such as the school’s Women’s Law Caucus and graduates, and she will hold office hours to build personal connections with students, staff and faculty.

Amiri has been litigating reproductive rights cases for two decades. She is currently involved in numerous challenges, including leading the lawsuit against Kentucky’s total abortion ban. She was also member of the team challenging Texas Senate Bill 8. Amiri has been an adjunct assistant professor at New York Law School and Hunter College. She serves on the Ibis Reproductive Health board of directors and previously served on the Law Students for Reproductive Justice’s board of directors. Before joining the ACLU, Amiri worked as an attorney at South Brooklyn Legal Services in the Foreclosure Prevention Project and at the Center for Reproductive Rights. Amiri was featured in “The Fight,” a documentary that profiled four attorneys (including Chase Strangio ’10) who fought the Trump administration in the courts.

Expanding upon the success of Northeastern Law’s signature Women in the Law Conference, the Brown Forum, named in honor of Professor Emerita Judith Olans Brown, was established by Brown and her husband, Jim, in 2021 to support the advancement of women attorneys and students at Northeastern Law. The Practitioner-in-Residence program was launched in 2022 with leading civil rights and employment lawyer Debra Katz as the first Practitioner-in-Residence.

The 15th annual Women in the Law Conference will take place on May 5, 2023, with the theme, Women’s Rights are Human Rights.