ABA Midyear Meeting 2016: The SOGI Stonewall Awards

In this Special Report, Deputy General Counsel to the Oregon State Bar Mark Roberts and ABA Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Director Malcolm ‘Skip’ Harsch stop by to discuss the Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity’s Stonewall Awards and introduce the 2016 award honorees. The Stonewall Award is named after the 1969 Stonewall Riots that took place in New York City and recognizes lawyers, members of the judiciary, and legal academics who have affected real change to remove barriers on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in the legal profession. This year’s honorees, Talmadge Fitzpatrick Tribe partner Thomas Fitzpatrick, Nashville attorney Abby Rubenfeld, and Freedom to Marry Founder and President Evan Wolfson, sit down with Legal Talk Network producer Laurence Colletti to discuss their hard work and accomplishments in the fight for LGBT rights.

Mark Roberts is the deputy general counsel to the Oregon State Bar. He received his bachelor of arts degree from Reed College and his Juris Doctor from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law.

Malcolm ‘Skip’ Harsch is the director of the ABA Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. He is a board member of the Lesbian and Gay Bar Association of Chicago and received his bachelor of science in biology from the University of Iowa. Malcolm received his J.D. from DePaul University College of Law.

Thomas Fitzpatrick is a partner at Talmadge Fitzpatrick Tribe in Seattle. He graduated from the University of Montana and received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School.

Abby Rubenfeld is an attorney in Nashville, Tennessee. She filed the lawsuit in 2013 that led the U.S. Supreme Court to legalize gay marriage and was the director of Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund. She graduated from Princeton University and received her J.D. at Boston University Law School.

Evan Wolfson is the founder and president of Freedom to Marry. He earned a B.A. in history from Yale College and teaches at Georgetown Law Center where he has been named a distinguished visitor from practice.