New Georgia Project adds chief legal officer

A veteran Atlanta attorney and voting rights activist will join the nonpartisan voter-registration group The New Georgia Project, later this month as its first chief legal officer, Atlanta Civic Circle has learned.

“While I do think that focusing on advocacy within our elections is paramount to ensuring that voters can enjoy equitable ballot access, it’s important to me that all bases are covered,” Khondoker told Atlanta Civic Circle. “With NGP, we can do work within policy, litigation, and advocacy. So we have greater power to help Georgia realize the democracy we deserve with the New Georgia Project.”

Aklima Khondoker begins her new job at The New Georgia Project on May 17. Khondoker previously served as Georgia State Director for All Voting is Local, a campaign within the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a Washington, D.C.-based group of 200 national organizations that works to promote and protect the civil rights of individuals in America. Her last day at All Voting is Local was April 30.

The New Georgia Project has been at the forefront of voting rights issues in Georgia. The nonpartisan organization headed by Chief Executive Officer Nsé Ufot has registered more than a half-million new voters in Georgia since it launched its voter registration program in 2014, according to the organization.

Before working for All Voting is Local, Khondoker was a staff attorney and the senior manager for the Voting Access Project at the ACLU of Georgia. It was a project she said she created and designed to “open pathways to the ballot.” While at the ACLU of Georgia, she focused on First and Fourth Amendment issues, women’s reproductive freedoms, and voting rights.

Her voting rights work in Georgia includes litigation and advocacy. She’s been involved in the development and execution of voting rights strategy that has included crafting policy and regulatory proposals, partnership development, monitoring local election boards, and successfully advocating for more voting sites.

During the 2020 election cycle in Georgia, Khondoker worked to expand voting access statewide, including adding ballot dropboxes, opening early vote sites in communities of color, and advocating for ballot access expansion through effective election administration at both the state and county level.

Khondoker holds a bachelor of arts degree in psychology from Stony Brook University and a law degree from John Marshall Law School in Atlanta. She is licensed to practice law in all Georgia courts. She is committed to local and national initiatives that both serve the community and gives everyone a voice through their vote.

(Header image: Aklima Khondoker)

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