Spring 2025 Undergraduate Legal Intern, Trone Center for Justice and Equality

The ACLU seeks an Undergraduate Intern in the Trone Center for Justice and Equality of the ACLU’s National office in New York, NY.

 The Team:

The ACLU’s Trone Center for Justice and Equality focuses on America’s issues around crime, punishment, and racial justice. These three issues are constantly intersecting and the implications for social and economic success in communities of color are hanging in the balance. As a result, race and class permeate the entire criminal justice system, and today robust discussions about race in America are bringing issues of racial justice into the spotlight. This is a critical time in the fight to advance racial justice and to truly reform the criminal legal system. The Trone Center contains five Projects/Programs working towards these goals: the Capital Punishment Project, the National Prison Project, the Racial Justice Program, Criminal Law Reform Project, and the John Adams Project.  

 What You'll Do:

The Trone Center for Justice and Equality is seeking an intern to work on the issues it addresses, including the following: seeking to end excessively harsh criminal justice policies that result in mass incarceration, over-criminalization, and racial injustice; fighting for nationwide reforms to pretrial detention and surveillance, police practices, public defense systems, disproportionate sentencing, and prosecutorial abuses of authority in the name of public safety; challenging the unfairness and arbitrariness of capital punishment while working towards the ultimate goal of abolishing the death penalty; improving conditions for people in prisons, jails, and detention centers and increasing oversight and accountability in places of detention; and confronting racial discrimination in education, housing, fair lending, policing, and the criminal justice system. The intern will provide research and writing support to the Trone Center team. The intern will also work on other Center priorities and issue areas as assigned. 

Your Day to Day:

• Conduct research and analysis on issues in the criminal justice and racial justice fields  

• Draft communications, memos, and presentations  

• Assist the Legal Operations team in department-wide initiatives, trainings, and compliance   
• Support the Trone Center and the work of the Trone Center Director in other tasks as assigned   

 

What You'll Bring: 

This Internship is open to undergraduate students. Interns should possess the following: 

• Demonstrated commitment to the issues on which the Trone Center for Justice and Equality works 

• Excellent research, writing, and verbal communication skills 

• Excellent interpersonal skills and a proven ability to work independently as well as within a team 

• Self-motivated with the ability to take initiative, manage a variety of tasks and see projects through to completion 

• Demonstrate a commitment to diversity within the office using a personal approach that values all individuals and respects differences in regards to race, ethnicity, age, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, religion, disability and socio-economic circumstance 

• Commitment to the mission of the ACLU 
• Valid work authorization for those seeking an ACLU stipend 

Internship Logistics:

• • Location: Our Internship Program offers a limited number of remote or hybrid intern positions. Candidates for this internship can select a fully remote or hybrid (part in-person and part remote) arrangement.
  • Time Commitment: This internship requires a part-time commitment of 15 or 20 hours per week.
  • Internship Duration: Part-time internships extend for a 12-week period. This internship has a start date of: January 13 or January 27, 2025.
  • Compensation: This position is for course credit.

ABOUT THE ACLU 

The ACLU dares to create a more perfect union – beyond one person, party, or side. Our mission is to realize this promise of the United States Constitution for all and expand the reach of its guarantees. For over 100 years, the ACLU has worked to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Whether it’s ending mass incarceration, achieving full equality for the LGBTQ+ community, establishing new privacy protections for our digital age, or preserving the right to vote or the right to have an abortion, the ACLU takes up the toughest civil liberties cases and issues to defend all people from government abuse and overreach. 

Equity, diversity, and inclusion are core values of the ACLU and central to our work to advance liberty, equality, and justice for all. We are a community committed to learning and growth, humility and grace, transparency and accountability. We believe in a collective responsibility to create a culture of belonging for all people within our organization – one that respects and embraces difference; treats everyone equitably; and empowers our colleagues to do the best work possible. We are as committed to anti-oppression and anti-racism internally as we are externally. Because whether we’re in the courts or in the office, we believe ‘We the People’ means all of us. 

Why the ACLU:

For over 100 years, the ACLU has worked to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Whether it’s ending mass incarceration, achieving full equality for the LGBTQ+ community, establishing new privacy

protections for our digital age or preserving the right to vote or the right to have an abortion, the ACLU takes up the toughest civil liberties cases and issues to defend all people.

Our Commitment to Accessibility, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion  

Accessibility, equity, diversity, and inclusion are core values of the ACLU and central to our work to advance liberty, equality, and justice for all. For us diversity, equity and inclusion are not just check-the-box activities, but a chance for us to make long-term meaningful change. We are a community committed to learning and growth, humility and grace, transparency and accountability. We believe in a collective responsibility to create a culture of belonging for all people within our organization – one that respects and embraces difference; treats everyone equitably; and empowers our colleagues to do the best work possible. We are as committed to anti-oppression and anti-racism internally as we are externally. Because whether we’re in the courts or in the office, we believe ‘We the People’ means all of us. 

With this commitment in mind, we strongly encourage applications from all qualified individuals without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, national origin, marital status, citizenship, disability, veteran status and record of arrest or conviction, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. 

The ACLU is committed to providing reasonable accommodation to individuals with disabilities. If you are a qualified individual with a disability and need assistance applying online, please email benefits.hrdept@aclu.org. If you are selected for an interview, you will receive additional information regarding how to request an accommodation for the interview process.