Our Board
Immigration Equality Action Fund's Board of Directors comprises immigrants, attorneys, and other activists from around the United States.
David Bardeen is corporate counsel with Ziff Brothers Investments, a private investment fund based in New York, and a freelance writer. He received a J.D. from New York University, where he was managing editor of the NYU Law Review, and a B.A. in Government from Harvard College. From 2002-2005, he was an associate in the New York office of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, where he focused on Latin American corporate and securities transactions. He also spent a summer in Quito, Ecuador with the Center for Economic and Social Rights. David's writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, New York Press and other publications.
Ron Buckmire has been a “militant homosexual activist” since 1991, when he created the Queer Resources Directory, the first comprehensive directory of LGBT and HIV/AIDS information on the Internet. He was born in Grenville, Grenada, and earned B.Sc., M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Mathematics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York state from 1986 to1994. In 1994, he joined the Mathematics department of Occidental College (Barack Obama’s first alma mater) and is now Associate Professor and Chair. In 2006, he co-founded the Barbara Jordan/ Bayard Rustin Coalition, a Black LGBT advocacy organization in Los Angeles. He serves as Board President for both the Center for Health Justice and Jordan/Rustin Coalition. He has previously served on the Board of Directors of the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, Equality California and the PlanetOut Corporation. Before becoming a naturalized United States citizen in 2003, he was the foreign half of a binational couple and organized our former Los Angeles chapter. He blogs daily at The Mad Professah Lectures at MadProfessah.com and lives in northeast Los Angeles with his husband, Dean Elzinga.
Raymond Fisher is a securities lawyer and a partner with Ashurst LLP in London. Prior to his current position with Ashurst, Ray was a partner with Linklaters LLP in Frankfurt and in New York/Sao Paulo and a partner and associate with Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP in New York. He holds a B.A. from Harvard College and a J.D. and M.A. from New York University. Ray and his partner Juan Carlos Palomino enjoy traveling, skiing, bicycling, gardening, cooking and the arts. With a 14-year history of interaction as a binational couple with US visa policies, Ray and Juan Carlos know first-hand the frustrations of visa-based periods of forced separation and of relocation in order to stay together.
Andre Haddad is an Internet entrepreneur, executive and investor. Most recently he was CEO of Shopping.com, the leading online comparison-shopping network, a company eBay acquired for $600M in 2005. Previously, Andre was Senior Vice President, Product at eBay. He was responsible for product management, design and research at eBay's global marketplace business. Andre played several roles at eBay including GM in Europe, VP International Operations and VP User Experience and Design. Previous to eBay, Andre co-founded iBazar, a leading European auction marketplace, which was acquired by eBay in 2001 for $140m. Andre was the COO at iBazar, with responsibility over Product, Marketing, Operations and International. Before iBazar, Andre was a brand manager at P&G and a consultant at Booz Allen & Hamilton. He graduated from HEC Paris.
Mary Beth Henson is the Vice President, Finance of City Harvest, the world's first food rescue organization, dedicated to feeding New York City's hungry men, women, and children. Prior to City Harvest, Mary Beth was a Managing Director and Co-Head of the Global Retailing Investment Banking Group at Merrill Lynch. She has more than 20 years of experience in finance, including work in investment banking, treasury operations and structured finance, and international banking. Mary Beth has an MBA from New York University and a BA in Economics/English Literature from the University of Virginia. Mary Beth and her partner Danielle (a Canadian citizen) live in New York City and on the North Fork of Long Island.
Prerna Lal is a 1L at George Washington University Law School. She is a Co-Founder and Online Coordinator of DreamActivist, a vibrant activist immigrant youth community online that has mobilized thousands to action. Her work and opinion has been featured in publications like the New York Times, US News & World Report, USA TODAY, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, The Advocate and other alternative and ethnic media outlets. Having scored multiple victories using new media, Prerna also freelances as an Immigrant Rights and Race in America blogger for Change.org.
Joseph Landau is a lawyer and Associate Professor at Fordham Law School, where he focuses on civil procedure, administrative law, and immigration. Prior to Fordham, he was an Associate-in-Law at Columbia Law School and, before that, an associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, LLP, where he specialized in securities and corporate litigation and coordinated Cleary Gottlieb’s pro bono immigration and international human rights practice group. He clerked for Judge Betty Binns Fletcher on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Judge David G. Trager of the Eastern District of New York. Joe received his J.D. from the Yale Law School and a B.A. from Duke University. He was assistant managing editor at The New Republic magazine from 1997 through 1999. He has been on the Immigration Equality Board since 2006 and has chaired both the Immigration Equality and Action Fund boards since June 2010.
Navin Manglani obtained his BA from Yale in Economics, and then completed his MBA at Columbia Business School in 2002. After business school, he served as Managing Director at IE Industries, his family's privately-held company in the fashion industry. After selling the company, he co-founded and serves as a director of SKMN Investments LP, an investment company with a strong focus on residential real estate. Navin's involvement in Immigration Equality began as a result of being in a binational relationship. As he spent more time learning about the organization, he cared deeply about the struggles that binational couples and asylum seekers face due to discriminatory immigration practices. Navin co-chaired the Safe Haven Awards and soon after, joined the board. Navin also serves as the Treasurer of the Vanderbilt Condominium (a 340-unit condo in Midtown). He is an avid musician and has served as a principal cellist for the New York Symphonic Arts Ensemble. He also loves eating and enjoys blogging about his culinary experiences in New York during his free time on his blog veggiescoop.com.
Ranesh Ramanathan is Associate General Counsel to Bain Capital, a Boston based multi-asset alternative manager, where he acts as lead counsel to the firm's trading businesses and Asia private equity business. Prior to joining Bain Capital, Ranesh was General Counsel to Citi Private Equity and Associate General Counsel to Citi Alternative Investments. Ranesh began his legal career as an associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, LLP. Ranesh earned his JD from New York University and his B.A. from The Johns Hopkins University. As part of a binational gay couple and a former asylee to the United States, Ranesh is personally vested in all of Immigration Equality Action Fund’s work.
Andrew Sullivan is a writer, blogger, political commentator and columnist whose site The Daily Dish, at the Atlantic Magazine, is one of the most widely read blogs on the web. Originally from Southern England, Sullivan attended Reigate Grammar School, and Magdalen College, Oxford. In 1984, he won a Harkness Fellowship to Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, and earned a Masters degree in Public Administration. He later earned his PhD from Harvard as well. Sullivan has worked as an associate and deputy editor at The New Republic, where he remains a senior editor, and his work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Nation, The Sunday Times of London and other prominent media outlets. His books include Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality and The Conservative Soul. He is a regular contributor to NBC’s Chris Matthews Show and a frequent guest on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher. Sullivan has appeared on over 100 radio shows across the United States, as well as on major news magazines and public affairs programs, including Nightline, Face The Nation, Meet The Press, Crossfire, Hardball, The O'Reilly Factor, The Larry King Show, Reliable Sources, Hannity and Colmes, and others.
Susan J. Zachman is a corporate partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP's New York office where she specializes in private equity transactions. Sue sits on Kirkland & Ellis' firm-wide diversity committee and its LGBT and Gender Subcommittees and is coordinator of the firm's pro bono LGBT Asylum Project and also its pro bono Uncontested Divorce Project. Sue received her J.D from Columbia Law School and M.B.A from Columbia Business School, and also received a M.S. Electrical Engineering from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology and a B.S. Electrical Engineering from the University of California - San Diego. Sue was formerly the Director of Regulatory Affairs for start-up medical device company Biosense Israel, before it was sold to Johnson & Johnson, becoming part of its Biosense Webster electrophysiology division in 1998.