"Despite advocates' best efforts,the battle to vote marches on. The courts no longer serve as a beacon of light in the darkness of discrimination. Instead of voting rights, it is essentially voting fights."
Law Professor
Gilda R. Daniels is a Professor of Law at the University of Baltimore School of Law. She is a former Deputy Chief in the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Voting Section. She also served as Litigation Director at Advancement Project National Office-supporting the justice, education, immigrants’ rights and voting projects-and as a staff attorney at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. Professor Daniels is a nationally recognized voting rights and election law expert. She has investigated, negotiated, and litigated cases involving the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the National Voter Registration Act and other voting statutes. She teaches Election Law, Appellate Advocacy, Civil Procedure, and Critical Legal Theory, which includes jurisprudence, critical race theory, socioeconomics, and access to justice.
Legal Expert and Consultant
Gilda is a sought-after consultant and expert, as well as, a frequent contributor for media and conference panels. She lectures on voting issues on university campuses and various organizations ranging from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the American Constitution Society to her local church. Prior to beginning her voting rights career, Daniels was a staff attorney with the Southern Center for Human Rights representing death row inmates and bringing prison condition cases in Georgia and Alabama. She clerked in the United States Circuit Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit with the Honorable Joseph W. Hatchett. She is a graduate of New York University School of Law, where she was a Root Tilden Scholar, and Grambling State University.
Author & Speaker
Professor Daniels is the author of UNCOUNTED: The Crisis of Voter Suppression in America (NYU Press, released January 2020, paperback release October 2021). Ms. Magazine called Uncounted “required reading.” STARRED Booklist said that it “provides a road map and ...a valuable resource for all participants in civic life.” She has drafted and participated in amicus briefs filed in the United States Supreme Court on various civil rights and constitutional issues, frequently consults on voting rights cases, and is well published. Her scholarship focuses on the intersections of race, law, and democracy. Her law review articles have appeared in California Law Review, George Washington Law Review, Kentucky Law Journal, Cardozo Law Review, Denver Law Review, and New York University Journal of Legislation and Public Policy. Her writings have also been published in print media outlets and quoted in the national press, including the Washington Post and NPR’s 'All Things Considered'.