Chai Feldblum is a long-time civil rights advocate and scholar. As Legislative Counsel to the ACLU AIDS Project in the late 1980s, Chai played a leading role in drafting and negotiating the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. She later played the same role on the ADA Amendments Act of 2008. Chai also led the drafting and negotiating of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a bill to prohibit discrimination in employment on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
As a law professor at Georgetown Law, Chai created a Federal Legislation Clinic where she and her students helped non-profit organizations advance their legislative social justice goals. The Clinic’s clients included various disability organizations and Catholic Charities USA. Chai also founded and directed Workplace Flexibility 2010, an effort designed to bring employers and employees together on policy approaches to advance workplace flexibility.
Chai served as a Commissioner of the Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for almost a decade where she played a significant role in establishing the rights of LGBTQ employees under existing sex discrimination laws, enhancing the employment of people with disabilities, protecting the rights of pregnant workers, and leading a proactive effort to prevent harassment in the workplace. She also co-led a proactive effort to prevent harassment in the workplace through changes in workplace culture. Chai continued that work for two years at the law firm of Morgan Lewis in Washington DC.
In August 2021, Chai was appointed by President Biden to the Ability One Commission, where she currently serves as Vice Chair. The Ability One Commission is an independent federal agency that creates employment opportunities for people with significant disabilities through jobs obtained through federal contracts. Chai has helped lead the efforts to modernize the program.
Chai attended Barnard College and Harvard Law School and clerked for Judge Frank M. Coffin on the First Circuit Court of Appeals and for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun.