Legal Internship

Organizational Background

Make the Road New Jersey (MRNJ) is a community-based legal services organization that builds the power of Latinx, immigrant, and working-class communities to achieve dignity and respect. We do that through four key components that reach thousands of families every year:

• Community Organizing to change the systems and power structures affecting our communities;
• Legal and Support Services to tackle discrimination, abuse, and poverty;
• Policy Innovation to rewrite unfair laws/policies and make our democracy accountable to all of us;
• Transformative Education to develop leadership by amplifying our community members’ abilities to become leaders and lead in our movement.

MRNJ was founded in 2014 and is a sister organization to Make the Road New York, Make the Road Pennsylvania, Make the Road Connecticut, and Make the Road Nevada. MRNJ has organizing hubs in the immigrant-rich cities of Elizabeth, Passaic, and Perth Amboy, New Jersey. MRNJ’s grassroots membership base of working-class immigrants have won campaigns for local immigrant rights including municipal IDs and state-wide driver’s licenses, earned sick leave and an increase in the state minimum wage, sanctuary policies, state financial aid for undocumented students, the state’s first student success center at Elizabeth High School, and occupational licenses for all qualified residents regardless of status.

MRNJ’s legal team works to strengthen Make the Road NJ’s work by (1) providing legal and support services to help meet the immediate needs of MRNJ’s active members, which includes direct legal representation, consultations, and know-your-rights education; (2) helping to envision and implement leverage strategies (including strategic litigation) that help win our organizing campaigns; (3) providing technical legal support for policy work. Our attorneys specialize in immigration law, labor and employment law, housing law, and also handle a variety of civil matters, including public benefits advocacy, and tax advocacy.

Legal Internships

MRNJ seeks talented, public-interest oriented law students for a Summer Associate position for the Summer of 2026. Interns will work in the area of: immigration law (including deportation defense, Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, U and T visas, asylum, DACA, naturalization, and other forms of relief); employment law (including wage and hour, and discrimination cases, as well as class actions and strategic enforcement of laws Make the Road New Jersey developed and won including the New Jersey Wage Theft Act, and the first in the nation Temporary Workers Bill of Rights) and housing law (including eviction defense, rent control complaints, and affirmative actions under the Consumer Fraud Act). Interns will conduct legal research, assist with interviewing and otherwise supporting clients, and may also conduct Know Your Rights trainings for Make the Road NJ’s immigrant membership base. Through

these various projects, the Summer Associate will support organizing and policy efforts to build immigrant, worker, and tenant power.

The total ten-week stipend for this fellowship will be $10,000.

Qualifications

Applicants must intend to live and/or work in New Jersey following graduation. Applicants with experience working with, in, or on behalf of community-based organizations and with an interest in social justice are strongly encouraged to apply. Spanish language proficiency is required; fluency is preferred.

Application instructions

Interested applicants should send a resume, law school transcript and cover letter, including a brief description of their experience and area of interest via email to Lauren Herman, Esq., Legal Director at Lauren.Herman@maketheroadnj.org.