Joaquin Avila has devoted his career to a vision of voting rights advocacy that is premised on the conviction that government functions best if it is reflective and representative of the range of its constituents.  The Voting Rights Act of 1965 codified and articulated legal strictures that prevent government officials and private citizens from interfering with the rights of minority citizens to vote and to choose their representatives.  Through meticulously crafted legal suits, Avila challenges election systems that function to disenfranchise and discriminate against minority voters and their chosen candidates.

Joaquin Avila is a professor of law and Director of the National Voting Rights Advocacy Initiative at the Seattle University School of Law.  He has also worked in a private practice devoted exclusively to the protection of the voting rights of racial and ethnic minority communities.  He served as staff attorney (1974-1976), director of political access litigation and associate counsel (1976-78), and president and general counsel (1982-1985) of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF).

Joaquin Avila received a B.A. (1970) from Yale University and a J.D. (1973) from the Harvard University Law School.  He is a member of the California and Texas State bars.

Here are just a few articles by and about Joaquin Avila’s groundbreaking work:

• Joaquin Avila – Legal Foundation of Washington, Goldmark Keynote Speech 2005 “Renewing a Commitment to Seek Justice” 

• Joaquin Avila, Voting Rights in California: 1982-2006, Southern California Review of Law and Social Justice, Vol. 17, No. 131, Fall 2007

• Joaquin Avila, MacArthur Foundation Fellow Profile

• Law school to honor Joaquin Avila with Latino Amicus Award

• Voting Rights Activist Joaquin Avila ’73 Receives Harvard Law School Association Award

• Joaquin Avila Honored At The Latino Spirit Awards

• Letter to Monterey County Board of Supervisors 2011

• Joaquin Avila on C-SPAN 

• Voting rights expert Joaquin Avila to speak at Stanford University

• California Latino Legislative Service Honors Joaquin Avila

• Federal Court Rules Yakima’s Voting System Violates Voting Rights Act

• Sample State Voting Rights Act by Joaquin Avila

#RebelliousLawyering