NANCY NORTHUP
President
Nancy Northup is the President of the Center for Reproductive Rights, a global human rights organization that uses constitutional and international law to secure women's reproductive freedom. The Center has won groundbreaking cases before federal and state courts, U.N. committees, and regional human rights bodies, such as the European Court of Human Rights. Working at the state, national, and international levels, the Center has built the legal capacity of women's rights advocates around the world, working in over 45 countries.
Ms. Northup is an attorney with extensive experience in constitutional impact litigation, criminal law, and reproductive rights advocacy.
Since joining the Center for Reproductive Rights, Ms. Northup has served as key strategist in both domestic and international litigation. Under her leadership the Center has taken on bold cases in the U.S. and abroad. In just the past two years, the Center has, among many other victories, filed suit against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for its failure to make emergency contraception available over the counter, successfully challenged a Kansas law that would have required all sexual activity of minors under sixteen to be reported to the state. The Center was in the Supreme Court last term in Gonzales v. Carhart challenging the first ever federal abortion ban. Under her direction, the Center has broken new ground internationally, winning the first abortion case ever considered by the United Nations Human Rights Committee. The case, K.L. v. Peru, established that access to abortion, where legal, is a basic human right.
Ms. Northup holds adjunct appointments at NYU Law School and Columbia Law School and has taught courses in constitutional and human rights law. She has trained lawyers in litigation strategy in the Philippines, Nigeria and Bulgaria.
Ms. Northup graduated from Brown University and Columbia Law School, where she was a Kent Scholar and Managing Editor of the Columbia Law Review. She served as a law clerk to the Honorable Alvin B. Rubin of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans.
LUISA CABAL
Director, International Legal Program
Luisa Cabal is the Director of the International Legal Program at the Center for Reproductive Rights, where she leads the Center’s legal advocacy efforts in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe. In her nine years at the Center, Luisa has pioneered the Center's first international litigation efforts, filing cases before the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights and the United Nations Human Rights Committee. She also designed and co-coordinated the first comparative study in Latin America on women's rights jurisprudence of the region's highest level courts. She is co-founder of Red Alas, a network of Latin American law professors who are integrating a gender perspective and women's rights into law school curricula in the region. Luisa received her law degree from the Universidad de los Andes in Colombia, and her Master of Laws from Columbia University School of Law.
NANCY L. GOLDFARB
Director, Communications
Nancy Goldfarb is the Director of Communications. She is a veteran public relations and marketing professional with expertise in media relations, issues management, strategic positioning and crisis communications. Ms. Goldfarb has served as a senior communications counselor for leading global corporations, including Unilever and Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, for more than 20 years. She began her communications career in the public relations agency industry, working at Lobsenz-Stevens, Inc., and then Ketchum – one of the country's top PR firms – where she led the Consumer/Healthcare practice and developed award-winning campaigns for a diverse portfolio of clients.
She graduated magna cum laude from Boston University with a B.A. in sociology. Ms. Goldfarb is a member of New York Women in Communications, Inc. (NYWICI), a non-profit professional association.
VIVIAN LINDERMAYER
Vice President of Institutional Planning & Director of Development
Vivian Lindermayer is Vice President of Institutional Planning and Director of Development. Prior to joining the Center in 2001, Ms. Lindermayer was the Director of Development at the Center for Constitutional Rights, where she implemented major gift and special event strategies that dramatically increased funding from individual donors. From 1982 to 1993, she served on the senior editorial staff of Christianity and Crisis, where she initiated and edited award-winning articles and issues in the areas of reproductive rights, liberation theologies, human rights and economic and social justice. Ms. Lindermayer graduated with honors from Bryn Mawr College and did graduate work in philosophy at Columbia University.
CYNTHIA SOOHOO
Director, Domestic Legal Program
Cynthia Soohoo joined the Center in January 2008 as Director of the Domestic Legal Program. She brings a rich mix of experience in litigation, human rights advocacy, and legal education, making her well suited to lead the Center's efforts to employ bold human rights strategies in our U.S. legal advocacy work. Prior to joining the Center, she directed the Bringing Human Rights Home Project at the Human Rights Institute, Columbia Law School, beginning in 2001. The program works with attorneys and law students to develop and apply human rights strategies domestically. During her six years litigating cases at Covington & Burling, Cindy did extensive pro bono work, including work on the landmark human rights case Doe v. Karadzic. She clerked for the Honorable Gerard L. Goettel of the Southern District of New York. Cindy is a graduate of Williams College and the University of Pennsylvania Law School.
