Azadeh Shahshahani
Azadeh Shahshahani is the Director of the National Security/Immigrants' Rights Project at the ACLU of Georgia. The project is aimed at bringing Georgia and its localities into compliance with international human rights and constitutional standards in treatment of refugee and immigrant communities, including immigrant detainees. To that end, a variety of strategies are employed, including development of impact litigation, legislative advocacy, providing training to attorneys, human rights documentation and publishing of reports, public education, and coalition and movement building. Current focus areas of the project include: immigration detention, racial profiling and local enforcement of immigration laws, governmental surveillance, discrimination faced by Muslim, Middle Eastern, and South Asian communities, immigrant students’ access to K-12 and higher education, and language access in the court setting.
Azadeh is the editor of two human rights reports on 287(g) and racial profiling: "Terror and Isolation in Cobb: How Unchecked Police Power under 287(g) Has Torn Families Apart and Threatened Public Safety" and "The Persistence of Racial Profiling in Gwinnett: Time for Accountability, Transparency, and an End to 287(g)." She is also the author of a chapter on immigration and racial profiling in the 3rd edition of the volume “Cultural Issues in Criminal Defense”; an article in a forthcoming issue of Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts titled, “Field Notes on the 9/11 Moment: Transformations in Community and Country”; as well as a chapter on her immigrant experience in Wising Up Anthology: Shifting Balance Sheets: Women’s Stories of Naturalized Citizenship & Cultural Attachment. Azadeh’s opinion pieces have appeared in print and online publications such as the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the Fulton County Daily Report, the Huffington Post, and openDemocracy.
Azadeh currently serves as Executive Vice President and International Committee Co-Chair for the National Lawyers Guild; Co-Chair of the American Bar Association Committee on the Rights of Immigrants (of the Individual Rights and Responsibilities Section); Chair of Refugee Women's Network; and Chair of Georgia Detention Watch. Azadeh is also one of the Founders of Human Rights Atlanta and currently serves on its Coordinating Council.
Azadeh is a 2004 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, where she was a participant in the Third Colloquium on Challenges in International Refugee Law and served as Article Editor for The Michigan Journal of International Law. While in law school, Azadeh completed a fellowship with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Washington, DC; a research fellowship with a women's rights organization in Iran; as well as an internship with an immigrants' rights organization in Los Angeles.
Azadeh previously served as Interim Legal Director for the ACLU of Georgia. Before her move to Atlanta, she worked with the ACLU of North Carolina as Muslim/Middle Eastern Community Outreach Coordinator. In that capacity, she initiated a statewide campaign against racial profiling; coordinated a Continuing Legal Education seminar to train attorneys to represent Muslim and Middle Eastern clients facing human rights violations; and led a statewide campaign calling for the investigation of a North Carolina-based air carrier which has transported foreign nationals to torture and detention.
Azadeh was born in Iran and moved to the United States at age sixteen. She is the recipient of the University of Georgia Law School 2009 Equal Justice Foundation Public Interest Practitioner Award.