Our Team

Founder and Director

Karen Tumlin (she/her/hers) is a nationally recognized impact litigator focusing on immigrants’ rights. She successfully litigated numerous cases of national significance, including a challenge to the Trump Administration’s effort to end the DACA program and the Muslim Ban, as well as the constitutional challenge to Arizona’s notorious anti-immigrant law, SB 1070. She formerly served as the Director of Legal Strategy and Legal Director for the National Immigration Law Center, where she built a legal department of over 15 staff who developed and led cases of national impact.

Contact Karen: Karen.Tumlin@justiceactioncenter.org

Legal Director

Esther (she/her/ella) is the Legal Director with JAC who has litigated a number of groundbreaking cases, including suits challenging the Trump Administration’s Muslim and Refugee Bans and Arizona’s anti-immigrant SB 1070 law. Before becoming an immigrants’ rights impact litigator, Esther practiced at Munger Tolles & Olson in Los Angeles for six years, where her clients included the Getty Museum, Southern California Edison, and Transocean. She graduated magna cum laude from the University of Texas School of Law and clerked for the Honorable Lee H. Rosenthal on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas and the Honorable Allyson K. Duncan on the United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Contact Esther: Esther.Sung@justiceactioncenter.org

Deputy Director

Adela (she/her/ella) brings more than 15 years of communications and advocacy experience to Justice Action Center. Most recently, she served as a consultant to foundations and nonprofit organizations, advising on communications strategy and researching emergent themes in the integration between mobilization, fundraising, and communications. Prior to that, she was the communications director for the National Immigration Law Center, where she founded and built their communications platforms.

Contact Adela: Adela.Delatorre@justiceactioncenter.org

Counsel

Jane (she/her/hers) is a counsel with JAC who brings years of complex litigation experience to the JAC team. Before becoming an impact litigator focusing on immigrants’ rights, Jane practiced law at Morrison & Foerster LLP, successfully representing clients in a wide range of commercial and pro bono litigation matters. Jane graduated from Columbia Law School where she served as a managing editor of the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law.

Contact Jane: Jane.Bentrott@justiceactioncenter.org

Communications Director

Tasha (she/her/hers) joins JAC with a decade of nonprofit communications experience in service of social movements. Most recently, she spent eight years as the Communications Director for the National Lawyers Guild, where she grew its digital audience tenfold, launched digital programming initiatives, and created a publication outlet featuring legal analysis, artwork, and poetry by people in prison. Prior to that, Tasha worked with LatinoJustice PRLDEF, NALEO, and the Hispanic Federation in various civic engagement, voting rights, and communications capacities. 

Contact Tasha: Tasha.Moro@justiceactioncenter.org

Communications Coordinator

Joan (she/her/hers) joins JAC from the Council on African Studies where she worked on lecture series, film festivals and media platforms. She graduated with honors from Yale University in the Ethnicity, Race and Migration Department where her studies centered around community organizing and black feminist thought. Through accompaniment projects, she has conducted research on racial capitalism and organizing models for the Connecticut Bail Fund and Center for Popular Democracy. Most recently, she served as the Nancy Horton Bartels Senior Intern at the Yale African Art Gallery where she delivered a project on the urgency and practicality of repatriation. She is interested in the role of art in freedom dreaming and building a relationship to place that is guided by a grammar of liberation.

Contact Joan: Joan.Agoh@justiceactioncenter.org

Skadden Fellow

Laura (she/her/ella) received her J.D. from UC Irvine, School of Law, where she pursued her passion for serving immigrant communities and community-centered lawyering through her work in the Immigrant Rights Clinic, the COVID-19 Civil Rights Clinic, and her internships at the National Center for Youth Law and Public Advocates. Laura contributed over 200 hours of pro bono service during her law school career, working on matters ranging from DACA and asylum applications to criminal expungement petitions. Laura also served as an Articles Editor of the UC Irvine Law Review and a student leader for the Latinx Law Student Association.

Contact Laura: Laura.Flores@justiceactioncenter.org

Director, People Operations

Veonta (she/her) is a strategic human resources leader who brings more than 10 years of HR experience with more than 5 years of experience leading the HR function for organizations. Her experience spans various industries but is stewed in the public sector and non-profit organizations. She received her Bachelor of Business Administration from Cleveland State University, where she majored in human resource management, in 2011 and obtained a Master of Arts in Human Resource Management from the University of Houston-Clear Lake in 2016. In 2017, she obtained the senior certified professional certification from the Society of Human Resource Management and continues to maintain that credential.

Contact Laura: Veonta.Weathers@justiceactioncenter.org

Program Manager

Elia (she/ella) joins JAC as a Program Manager. Prior to JAC, Elia was a Program Analyst at the Acacia Center for Justice and the Vera Institute of Justice where she worked with the Legal Orientation Program (LOP) and Legal Orientation Program for Custodians (LOPC). In her role, Elia provided support and technical assistance to nonprofit legal service providers providing legal orientations to detained immigrants and custodians of children released from immigration custody.

Contact Elia: Elia.GilRojas@justiceactioncenter.org

Counsel

Vanessa (she/her/hers) joins JAC following an Immigrant Justice Corps fellowship with the federal litigation team at the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services in Texas. She graduated from Berkeley Law, where she was a Notes Editor for the California Law Review, a student in the International Human Rights Law Clinic, and a research fellow at the Miller Institute for Global Challenges and the Law. Throughout law school, Vanessa helped represent noncitizen clients through pro bono service and internships at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, Bay Area Legal Aid, and the California Asylum Representation Clinic.

Contact Vanessa: Vanessa.Rivas-Bernardy@justiceactioncenter.org