NELP - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Staff Attorney
- Member of the NELP Staff
Daniel Ocampo joined NELP in September 2022 as a Legal Fellow in NELP's Legal Task Force, then continued with NELP as Staff Attorney as part of the Work Structures team in 2023. Dan came to NELP immediately after graduating law school, where he spent much of his time as a student intern with the Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic. Through the clinic, Dan spent two years representing a group of rideshare and delivery drivers in Connecticut, organizing for better pay and working conditions and fighting back against endemic exploitation in the gig economy. This experience informed much of his worldview on the precarity of modern employment, particularly as it affects immigrant workers in underpaid jobs, and was part of the reason he wanted to join NELP after law school.
Dan also worked in clinic alongside Make the Road New York on federal litigation safeguarding the rights of DACA recipients, and with United We Dream on federal policy advocacy pushing for better legislative protections for all undocumented childhood arrivals. During his time in law school, Dan also spent one summer working on the House Judiciary Committee's immigration team, helping efforts to push immigration reform through a budget reconciliation bill, and the other summer split between the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project and the Consumer Protection Bureau at the New York Attorney General's Office.
Prior to law school, Dan worked as a paralegal at the New York Legal Assistance Group in the Special Litigation Unit, where he was staffed to a series of federal and state lawsuits challenging predatory student loan and debt collection practices. He also spent one year at Kids in Need of Defense in Houston, Texas, working closely with unaccompanied children facing removal proceedings. He is fluent in Spanish, speaks good French, and can speak basic conversational Farsi.
Dan is a proud member of the NELP Staff Association, NOLSW, UAW, LOCAL 2320. He is also a proud and dedicated supporter of Tottenham Hotspur and of the Houston Rockets. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, but was born and raised in London, United Kingdom.
Education
J.D., Yale Law School
Job Titles:
- Director of Work Structures
- Senior Staff Attorney and Became Director
Laura Padin joined NELP in 2018 as a senior staff attorney and became Director of Work Structures in November, 2021.
Laura's work focuses on policies that improve workplace standards and economic security for the contingent workforce, including temporary workers and workers in the "gig economy."
Prior to joining NELP, Laura was an attorney at the labor union coalition Change to Win, where she provided legal support to organizing and corporate accountability campaigns in many industries, including retail, telecommunications, fast food, and logistics. Prior to her work at Change to Win, Laura clerked for the Honorable Peter C. Dorsey in the District of Connecticut.
Laura believes deeply that all work has dignity and all people deserve economic security. Laura is a proud member of the NELP Staff Association, National Organization of Legal Services Workers, UAW Local 2320.
Education
J.D., New York University
B.S., Cornell University, Industrial and Labor Relations
Job Titles:
- Chief Executive Officer
- President
- National Leader
NELP is led by President and Chief Executive Officer Rebecca Dixon. Rebecca is a respected national leader in federal workers' rights advocacy and is in great demand for her thought leadership on issues of labor and racial, gender, and economic justice.
Job Titles:
- Senior Staff Attorney
- Member of the NELP Staff
Sally is a Senior Staff Attorney on the Work Structures team. She has been with the National Employment Law Project since February 2022. Sally supports NELP's efforts to ensure that all workers-including temporary, contracted, staffing, and app-based workers-enjoy good jobs by working with Black and immigrant-led partners to develop and advance enforceable labor standards.
Prior to NELP, Sally worked as an attorney at the Public Justice Center (PJC) in Maryland. There, she led PJC's Workplace Justice Project, representing low-wage workers in cutting-edge class and collective wage theft litigation, and worked on campaigns to advance policies to expand and protect workers' rights under Maryland state law. Sally was awarded the 2017 Benjamin L. Cardin Distinguished Service Award by the Maryland Legal Services Corporation for her outstanding work as a public interest attorney.
In her spare time, Sally enjoys spending time with family, appreciating nature, travel, reading, running, and hiking. She also enjoys a good joke. =)
Sally is a proud member of the NELP Staff Association, NOLSW, UAW, LOCAL 2320.