Please join five Powerful Latinas
as they discuss the importance and ramifications of the
nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor
to the U.S. Supreme Court, the highest Court in the land.

RAMONA ROMERO

Romero is National President of the Hispanic National Bar Association (www.HNBA.com). The Hispanic National Bar Association is a not-for-profit, national membership organization that represents the interests of the more than 100,000 Hispanic attorneys, judges, law professors, legal assistants, and law students in the United States and its territories.

Ramona is Corporate Counsel, Logistics and Energy at DuPont, where she is responsible for legal oversight of the acquisition of transportation, distribution, supply chain management and energy resources totaling billions of dollars each year. She also oversees related strategic litigation. Prior to joining DuPont, she handled complex commercial litigation at Crowell & Moring in Washington, DC for ten years.

Throughout her career, Ramona has been a volunteer leader in many community and professional organizations, and received numerous awards. This year, for example, Ramona was one of the 25 women honored by the Hispanic Business Magazine as part of its 7th Annual Woman of the Year Awards.

Ramona earned her BA from Barnard College, Columbia University in 1985 and her J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1988. She is admitted in Delaware (as in-house counsel), the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania.

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INGRID DURAN

Chair of the Board of Directors of the National Hispana Leadership Institute (www.NHLI.org). NHLI is the only national organization providing executive leadership programs for Latinas in the U.S. NHLI's mission is to develop Hispanas as ethical leaders through training, professional development, relationship building and community activism. NHLI seeks to transform the lives of Latinas and their communities by: Enhancing and developing leadership abilities among Latinas; Ensuring that Latinas are in leadership positions and have the access and power to influence public policy; Providing visible role models and mentors for Latinas; Improving services to Hispanics across the country through its extensive alumnae network. Its highly effective executive leadership program has been nationally recognized through awards by the Center for Creative Leadership, the Independent Sector, and the U.S. Hispanic Leadership Institute, among others.

Ingrid is Co-Founder & Principal of D&P Creative Strategies, a company that founded to increase the role of corporate, legislative and philanthropic efforts in addressing the concerns of Latinos, women, and gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) communities. Ingrid is also a Founding Executive Board Member of PODER PAC, a national Latina PAC created in an effort to increase the number of Latinas elected at all levels of government.

Prior to starting D&P & PODER PAC, Ingrid was President & CEO of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute. Earlier in her career, Ingrid worked for six years on Capitol Hill, and became well versed in the intricacies of the legislative and committee processes.

Ingrid also ran the Washington, DC office of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials.

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NINA PERALES

Southwest Regional Counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund in San Antonio, Texas. MALDEF (www.MALDEF.org) is the nation’s leading non-profit Latino legal organization. Often described as the "law firm of the Latino community," MALDEF promotes equality and justice through litigation, advocacy, public policy, and community education in the areas of employment, immigrants’ rights, voting rights, education, and language rights. In her role, Nina directs MALDEF's litigation, advocacy and public education in Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, and six additional southern and western states. Nina successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in LULAC v. Perry, a Latino vote-dilution challenge to the 2003 Texas congressional redistricting plan.

Nina specializes in voting rights litigation, including redistricting and vote dilution challenges. On March 1, 2006, she successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in LULAC v. Perry, a Latino vote-dilution challenge to the 2003 Texas congressional redistricting plan. In June 2006 the Court struck down the redistricting plan as a violation of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Nina received a Bachelor's degree from Brown University and earned her J.D. from Columbia University School of Law in 1990.

MALDEF is also the developer of the website www.SotomayorForJustice.com, which offers information on Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s background and federal judicial experience, the latest media clips, updates on the confirmation process and interviews.

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EVA PLAZA

Eva Plaza currently specializes in representing cities and redevelopment agencies statewide. She also represents clients in commercial litigation matters in state and federal court.

Eva has extensive experience in federal litigation with special expertise in commercial, contracts, and tort litigation. From 1993 to 1997, Eva served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice, in charge of all tort litigation cases brought against the United States and its agencies nationwide. Eva has argued a variety of significant cases involving federal environmental law, aviation law, medical malpractice and constitutional law.

Eva served as chief tort litigation advisor to the Justice Department, and was responsible for conferring, advising, and making recommendations to the Attorney General and the U.S. Attorneys concerning the defense of the Government's interests in all torts legal matters. Eva also served in the Clinton Administration in Washington D.C. as Assistant Secretary for the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Eva graduated with cum laude honors from Harvard University in 1980 and received a J.D. from Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California, Berkeley (1984), where she served as Editor of the California Law Review.

She has served on the board of the Hispanic National Bar Association and was President of the Hispanic Bar Association of D.C. Ms. Plaza was voted Hispanic Business Magazine’s 100 Most Influential Hispanics.

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JENNY MARTINEZ

Professor of Law and a Justin M. Roach, Jr. Faculty Scholar at Stanford Law School. Her scholarship makes the first major attempt to analyze the ramifications of the increasing number of international tribunals operating in a globalized environment, but without any supervening sovereign authority to which they are all bound.

An experienced litigator, Jenny argued the 2004 case of Rumsfeld v. Padilla before the U.S. Supreme Court, seeking to clarify the constitutional protections available to post-9/11 "enemy combatants'who are U.S. citizens. She has also served as a consultant for both Human Rights First and the International Center for Transitional Justice.

Before joining the Stanford Law School faculty in 2003, Jenny was a senior research fellow at Yale University and an attorney at Jenner & Block. She clerked for Justice Stephen Breyer of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and was an associate legal officer for Judge Patricia Wald of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.

Jenny has received the honor of being named National Law Journal's "Top 40 Lawyers Under 40"in 2005 and one of the "Top 20 Lawyers Under 40" in 2006 by California’s Daily Recorder.

Jenny received her BA from Yale University in 1993 and her JD from Harvard Law School in 1997.

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AURELIA FLORES

Founder and Host of Powerful Latinas.com, a company dedicated to providing online resources, networking and inspiration to Latina women nationwide. The company gathers together Latina women to learn from and share with one another, and provides a network among different Latin@ organizations across the country.

PowerfulLatinas.com launched its first project, an interview series, to compile a storehouse of wisdom from Latinas who have reached successful peaks in their lives. In particular, Aurelia was interested in speaking with successful Latina women who have overcome obstacles to provide inspiration to others that anything is possible.

Her own life story one of inspiration, Aurelia understands what it means to overcome obstacles. After becoming pregnant at 15, she graduated from high school a year early and went immediately to college where she received her B.A. in Sociology. She received her law degree from Stanford Law School and then was awarded a post-graduate Fulbright Fellowship to study in Mexico City.

She has practiced corporate and intellectual property law for over 10 years, first at a prominent law firm and later for a Fortune 500 company.

She now speaks about her own experiences, as well as sharing lessons from women whom she has interviewed. This Sotomayor panel discussion is one example of the kind of projects Powerful Latinas.com coordinates and presents.

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