Sheila Maddali

  • Grassroots Law & Organizing for Workers (formerly National Legal Advocacy Network)

  • 2022 Global Fellow

Sheila Maddali professional headshot
  • Grassroots Law & Organizing for Workers (formerly National Legal Advocacy Network)

  • 2022 Global Fellow

bold idea

Foster the growth of the low-wage worker movement by identifying and implementing legal strategies that build worker power, educate on workers’ rights, and mobilize lawyers in support of working-class people of color and their organizations.

organization overview

National Legal Advocacy Network (NLAN) partners with worker centers to identify and implement legal strategies that build worker power. NLAN develops relationships with lawyers and legal institutions throughout the country and uses them to support worker centers through a combination of strategic litigation, popular education, legislative advocacy, revenue generation, and technical support. NLAN is transforming the way law is performed in the low-wage worker movement by using the law to build power, rather than dependency, and cultivating a base of lawyers who use their skills to protect workers, embolden organizations, and advance the fight for racial and economic justice.

Personal Bio

Sheila Maddali is the co-founder and executive director of National Legal Advocacy Network, which leverages legal strategies to build worker power. An organizer and attorney, Sheila is visionary in strategizing about how the law can be used to build power rather than dependency. She began organizing around immigrant justice and racial profiling as a teenager, when her community was affected by post-9/11 state violence, and she has continued to work at the intersection of racial and economic justice for the past 20 years. Most recently, she was director of law and organizing at the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, where she led numerous successful workplace and legislative campaigns. Sheila has her J.D. from Rutgers University. Her work has been covered by numerous outlets, including the Washington Post, Reuters, and Law360. She is a sought-after speaker who has won awards from the South Asian Bar Association of New York, the Peggy Browning Fund, and the Coalition of Labor Union Women. She sits on the boards of People’s Parity Project, Juntos, and the Philadelphia Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.

  • Impact Location ?

    Countries or continents that were the primary focus of this Fellow’s work at the time of their Fellowship.

  • Organization Structure ?

    An organization can be structured as a nonprofit, for-profit, or hybrid (a structure that incorporates both nonprofit and for-profit elements).

    Nonprofit

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