Lisa Davis

Lisa Davis (LinkedIn – X – Wikipedia page) is the Senior Associate Dean of Clinical Programs, Professor of Law, and Co-Director of the Human Rights & Gender Justice Clinic (HRGJ) at CUNY School of Law. They also serve as Special Adviser on Gender and Other Discriminatory Crimes to the International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor, and previously held the role of Special Adviser on Gender Persecution. In that capacity, they drafted the ICC Office of the Prosecutor’s first-ever policy on the crime of gender persecution.

An internationally recognized expert on gender-based crimes and human rights in conflict and crisis settings, Davis focuses on how persecution works across multiple grounds, where gender may operate together with race, ethnicity, religion, political affiliation, disability status, and other grounds of discrimination, and on building the doctrinal tools that allow courts to charge those crimes as they are actually committed rather than in isolation. Their legal and advocacy work has been cited by the UN Security Council, UN General Assembly, the Supreme Court of India, Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace, the International Law Commission, Human Rights Watch, and others. Davis has also testified before the U.S. Congress, the European and U.K. Parliaments, the UN Security Council, and various international and regional human rights bodies. Their commentary has appeared in major media outlets, including The New York Times, CNN, and Reuters. In 2025, the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court recognized Prof. Davis for their contributions to advancing LGBTQI+ rights and the legal recognition of gender persecution.

Prof. Davis was a plaintiff in Gabor Rona & Lisa Davis v. Donald Trump, et al., which successfully challenged Executive Order 14203 on First Amendment grounds. The lawsuit contested the Trump administration’s sanctions targeting individuals associated with the International Criminal Court. In July 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled the executive order violated Davis’ and Rona’s free speech rights under the First Amendment and issued a permanent injunction.

As Special Adviser to the ICC Prosecutor, Prof. Davis helped shape the landmark gender persecution charges in the Afghanistan arrest warrants, the first in history to recognize LGBTQI+ victims of persecution as a crime against humanity. Davis worked closely on this case, including meeting with Afghan survivors who endured Taliban violence. By issuing these warrants, the ICC became the first international tribunal to determine it is a crime against humanity to persecute people based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Davis has also worked closely with Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace (Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz, or JEP), the country’s transitional justice tribunal. This collaboration contributed to the JEP’s 2023 landmark Macro-Case 02 decision, in which the tribunal charged armed actors with crimes against humanity for persecution based on gender, race, and ethnicity, recognizing the ways these forms of persecution often intersect. The Macro-Case 02 and 09 decisions cite Davis’s scholarship as part of their legal analysis.

Prof. Davis’ litigation and advocacy have influenced landmark jurisprudence in the Americas. In Karen Atala and Daughters v. Chile, they co-authored the sole amicus curiae brief arguing that sexual orientation and gender identity are protected classes under international law, contributing to a groundbreaking 2012 ruling by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights prohibiting discrimination on those grounds.

Davis also served as lead counsel in a case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on behalf of displaced Haitian women and girls subjected to sexual violence in post-earthquake camps. The case resulted in the Commission’s first-ever precautionary measures recognizing state responsibility to prevent third-party gender-based violence. A member of the JRR–UN Women SGBV Justice Experts Roster, Davis has advised on several international accountability mechanisms for atrocity crimes. Their scholarship includes the widely cited article Dusting Off the Law Books: Recognizing Gender Persecution in Conflicts and Atrocities, which has influenced both international legal judgments and academic discourse.

Davis is a graduate of CUNY School of Law and former Editor-in-Chief of the CUNY Law Review. In 2023, they co-founded the Institute on Gender, Law and Transformative Peace.