Linda Lye

Linda Lye is an experienced litigator who works on a wide variety of issues, including surveillance, open government, free speech, economic justice, and the death penalty.

Her current litigation includes a challenge to California’s lethal injection statute, and a challenge to a domestic spying program known as theNational Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative, which authorizes the collection and dissemination of personal information about individuals who have not engaged in any wrongdoing.

She has brought numerous successful Freedom of Information Act and Public Records Act cases on issues ranging from surveillance to the underwater mortgage crisis and the death penalty. She has also successfully litigated free speech cases in state and federal court.

She served as a lead negotiator in establishing a groundbreaking partnership between community organizations and Facebook to develop solutions to the affordable housing crisis. The partnership will bring $20 million in benefits to low-income communities near Facebook’s Menlo Park headquarters.

In 2015, The Recorder named Linda as one of “Four Public Interest Lawyers To Know.” She frequently lectures at conferences, and has been repeatedly invited to speak to federal judges and magistrates on surveillance issues. From 2014 through 2016, she served as a Lawyer Representative to the Ninth Circuit for the Northern District of California.

Linda was previously a partner at Altshuler Berzon, a San Francisco law firm specializing in labor and employment law. She clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the United States Supreme Court and Judge Guido Calabresi of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. She received her law degree from the University of California at Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law and her undergraduate degree from Yale College.