TakeRoot Justice is accepting applications for sponsorship for two-year postgraduate legal fellowships starting in the Fall of 2027 (applications to fellowship foundations due Fall 2026). TakeRoot Justice specifically seeks fellows to work on projects developed by our Capacity Building, Housing & Tenants’ Rights, Immigrants’ Rights and Workers’ Rights practices.

TakeRoot Justice seeks rising third year law students, recent law graduates with judicial clerkships beginning in the Fall, and those currently completing a judicial clerkship to sponsor for two year public interest law fellowships offered by the Skadden Fellowship Foundation, Equal Justice Works, and similar programs.

About TakeRoot Justice

TakeRoot Justice provides legal, participatory research and policy support to strengthen the work of grassroots and community-based groups in New York City to dismantle racial, economic and social oppression. TakeRoot Justice employs a unique model of partnership with grassroots and community
based groups. Our partners take the lead in determining the priorities and goals for our work and advance our understanding of justice. This upends the traditional power dynamics between communities and service providers. We believe in a theory of change where shortt
erm and individual successes help build the capacity and power of our partners, who in turn can have longer
term impact on policies, laws and systems that affect their communities. Our work has greater impact because it is done in connection with organizing, building power and leadership development. We believe that community organizing should be at the center of any effort to create sustainable, systemic change. TakeRoot Justice has a long history of partnering with grassroots and community
based organizations that build leadership and power within New York City’s low
income communities, particularly communities of color, immigrant communities and others who are traditionally excluded from policymaking. Only true democracy will achieve the progressive change we need to end systemic oppression. We model our internal structure on anti oppressive and democratic principles in order to create an environment that mirrors the progressive change we pursue through our work.

About the Capacity Building Practice

We support and strengthen worker-owned cooperatives, community-based institutions, grassroots campaigns and local organizing. In addition to providing public policy support and technical support for local campaigns, our practice area advises on a variety of transactional matters, including incorporation, tax exemption, internal governance, contracts, commercial leases, and compliance with corporate, non-profit, employment, tax, and other laws.

About the Consumer Justice Practice

We support community-based organizations whose members and constituents are experiencing debt collection abuses. We represent low-income consumers on matters such as identity theft, credit reporting issues, rental arrears lawsuits, and unlawful debt collection practices. Our work often intersects with other practice areas in TakeRoot, such as Immigrants’ Rights and Tenants’ Rights.

About the Housing & Tenants’ Rights Practice

We provide direct legal assistance to community groups, their organizers, and their members engaged in tenant organizing. Our practice includes affirmative litigation on behalf of tenant associations, as well as individual anti-eviction litigation. We train community groups and their members on tenants’ rights issues, collaborate with tenant organizers, assist with legislative and/or regulatory advocacy, and lead housing clinics. Types of cases include HP actions for repairs, rent strikes, and 7A proceedings to strip landlords of control of their buildings.

About the Immigrants’ Rights Practice

We believe in the freedom of movement and migration for all people. The immigration system is designed to exclude, surveil, and punish immigrants of color to uphold white supremacy. As community lawyers, we believe that our role is to support directly impacted immigrant communities of color who are leading movements to change this racist, imperialist, violent system.

Our Immigrants’ Rights team partners with community-based organizations rooted in such communities to support their work to build power by:

Assisting their members in obtaining and maintaining immigration status through staffing community-based legal clinics, providing screenings and consultations, as well as direct representation;
Offering popular education workshops and Know Your Rights trainings to provide essential and up-to-date information on changing immigration policies;
Providing rapid response and support for individual members targeted by ICE;
Working in coalition with local and national immigrants’ rights groups;
Providing technical support for partners’ campaigns for legislative and policy changes; and,
Challenging harsh immigration laws and enforcement practices.

In addition, we believe that the struggle for immigrant justice is deeply connected with the struggle for all working-class people. Thus, we provide immigration support to community partners of TakeRoot’s other practice areas and support the broader immigrants’ rights movement in New York City where we can.

About the Workers’ Rights Practice

We provide legal services for members of community-based worker centers and organizations in all five boroughs of New York City, representing low-wage workers in the domestic service, retail, hospitality, construction, and manufacturing industries. Our legal work centers around federal and state court litigation and agency adjudication of minimum wage and overtime violations, tip theft, retaliation, discrimination, sexual harassment, sick leave, and labor trafficking claims. We also collaborate with our community partners in support of their organizing campaigns.

Qualifications:

Applicants must either be admitted to the New York Bar or sitting for the New York Bar no later than July 2027.
Eagerness to work with a diverse client base
Commitment to movements for economic and racial justice in New York City
Professional or personal experience working with diverse communities and across lines of difference
Commitment to working in partnership with community organizers and developing creative lawyering strategies to support tenant organizing

The ideal candidate will also have:

A personal connection to the work
Experience with community organizing or working in support of organizing campaigns
Professional competency in a second language commonly spoken by TakeRoot’s clients, especially Bengali, French, Haitian Creole, Mandarin, Nepali, Spanish and/or Tagalog,

Project Proposals:

TakeRoot Justice is interested in sponsoring candidates who either already have a vision for their project or would like to work with TakeRoot Justice staff to develop a new proposal. Any proposal must consider TakeRoot Justice’s model of partnering with community based organizations. A list of our current partners can be found on our website at www.takerootjustice.org.

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2027 Legal Fellowship Candidates