Marjorie Cohn became president of the National Lawyers Guild in October 2006. She also was recently recognized as one of San Diego’s Top Attorneys in Academics for 2006. She lectures throughout the world on international human rights and U.S. foreign policy.

A news consultant for CBS News, and a legal analyst for Court TV, she also provides legal and political commentary on BBC, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, NPR and Pacifica Radio. Co-author of the book Cameras in the Courtroom: Television and the Pursuit of Justice, Professor Cohn has published numerous articles in such journals as Fordham Law Review, Hastings Law Journal and Virginia Journal of International Law, as well as The National Law Journal, Christian Science Monitor and Chicago Tribune.

Professor Cohn is a contributing editor to Jurist, MWC News and Guild Practitioner. She has been a criminal defense attorney at the trial and appellate levels for many years, and was staff counsel to the California Agricultural Labor Relations Board. Professor Cohn is the U.S. representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists. The recipient of the San Diego County Bar Association’s 2005 Service to Legal Education Award, she sits on the Advisory Board for the Haywood Burns Memorial Fellowships for Social and Economic Justice, and serves on the Roster of Experts at the Institute for Public Accuracy. Professor Cohn was a legal observer in Iran on behalf of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers in 1978 and she has participated in delegations to Cuba, China and Yugoslavia. She lived in Mexico and is fluent in Spanish. Professor Cohn has taught at Thomas Jefferson since 1991.

Blog Entries by Marjorie Cohn

Legendary Lawyer Doris Brin Walker Dies; Represented Angela Davis, Smith Act Defendants

Posted August 24, 2009 | 02:24 PM (EST)


Doris "Dobby" Brin Walker, the first woman president of the National Lawyers Guild, died on August 13 at the age of 90. Doris was a brilliant lawyer and a tenacious defender of human rights. The only woman in her University of California Berkeley law school class, Doris defied the odds...

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Agent Orange Continues to Poison Vietnam

6 Comments | Posted June 15, 2009 | 06:14 PM (EST)


From 1961 to 1971, the U.S. military sprayed Vietnam with Agent Orange, which contained large quantities of Dioxin, in order to defoliate the trees for military objectives. Dioxin is one of the most dangerous chemicals known to man. It has been recognized by the World Health Organization as a carcinogen...

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Obama's Guantánamo Appeasement Plan

2 Comments | Posted May 26, 2009 | 11:38 AM (EST)


Two days after his inauguration, President Obama pledged to close Guantánamo within one year. The Republicans, led by Senators John McCain, Mitch McConnell and Pat Roberts, immediately launched a concerted campaign to assail the new president. They claimed his plan would release dangerous terrorists into U.S. communities and allow released...

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Stanford Anti-War Alumni, Students Call for Condi War Crimes Probe

329 Comments | Posted May 8, 2009 | 06:12 PM (EST)


During the Vietnam War, Stanford students succeeded in banning secret military research from campus. Last weekend, 150 activist alumni and present Stanford students targeted Condoleezza Rice for authorizing torture and misleading Americans into the illegal Iraq War.

Veterans of the Stanford anti-Vietnam War movement had gathered for...

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Condi Channels Nixon: If the President Says So, It's Not Illegal

2 Comments | Posted May 1, 2009 | 11:42 AM (EST)


On April 27, Condoleezza Rice had a brief Q & A with some Stanford students:

See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijEED_iviTA.

Condi was extremely uncomfortable, defensive and nervous. She was rude to the first student, interrupted him and yelled at him.

When asked by another student about a recent report that she...

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Torture Used to Link Saddam with 9/11

Posted April 23, 2009 | 08:19 PM (EST)


When I testified last year before the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties about Bush interrogation policies, Congressman Trent Franks (R-Ariz) stated that former CIA Director Michael Hayden had confirmed that the Bush administration only waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zabaydah, and Abd al-Rahim...

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Spain Investigates What America Should

Posted April 8, 2009 | 12:32 PM (EST)


A Spanish court has initiated criminal proceedings against six former officials of the Bush administration. John Yoo, Jay Bybee, David Addington, Alberto Gonzales, William Haynes and Douglas Feith may face charges in Spain for authorizing torture at Guantanamo Bay.

If arrest warrants are issued, Spain and any of the other...

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Memos Provide Blueprint for Police State

Posted March 9, 2009 | 01:48 PM (EST)


Seven newly released memos from the Bush Justice Department reveal a concerted strategy to cloak the President with power to override the Constitution. The memos provide "legal" rationales for the President to suspend freedom of speech and press; order warrantless searches and seizures, including wiretaps of U.S. citizens; lock up...

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A Call to End All Renditions

Posted February 11, 2009 | 04:26 PM (EST)


By Marjorie CohnJurist

Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian residing in Britain, said he was tortured after being sent to Morocco and Afghanistan in 2002 by the U.S. government. Mohamed was transferred to Guantánamo in 2004 and all terrorism charges against him were dismissed last year. Mohamed was a victim...

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Israel's Collective Punishment of Gaza

Posted January 6, 2009 | 06:01 PM (EST)


Since Israel began its war on Gaza 11 days ago, more than 560 Palestinians -- about a quarter of them civilians -- have been killed. Some two thousand Gazans, including hundreds of children, have been wounded. Israel's "Operation Cast Lead" marks an escalation of Israel's two-year blockade of the Gaza...

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Cheney Throws Down Gauntlet, Defies Prosecution for War Crimes

Posted December 19, 2008 | 02:10 PM (EST)


Dick Cheney has publicly confessed to ordering war crimes. Asked about waterboarding in an ABC News interview, Cheney replied, "I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared." He also said he still believes waterboarding was an appropriate method to use on terrorism suspects....

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Obama: Ratify the Women's Convention Soon

Posted December 12, 2008 | 12:03 PM (EST)


Nearly 30 years after President Jimmy Carter signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the United States remains the only democracy that refuses to ratify the most significant treaty guaranteeing gender equality. One hundred eighty-five countries, including over 90 percent of members of...

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A Palin Theocracy

Posted September 11, 2008 | 01:44 AM (EST)


John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate has invigorated a lackluster campaign. The media can't stop talking about her. Given McCain's age and state of health (his medical file was nearly 1,200 pages long), Palin would indeed be a heartbeat away from becoming President. But...

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Preemptive Strikes Against Protest at RNC

Posted September 3, 2008 | 03:37 PM (EST)


In the months leading up to the Republican National Convention, the FBI-led Minneapolis Joint Terrorist Task Force actively recruited people to infiltrate vegan groups and other leftist organizations and report back about their activities. On May 21, the Minneapolis City Pages ran a recruiting story called "Moles Wanted." Law enforcement...

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End the Occupation of Iraq -- and Afghanistan

Posted July 29, 2008 | 05:22 PM (EST)


So far, Bush's plan to maintain a permanent U.S. military presence in Iraq has been stymied by resistance from the Iraqi government. Barack Obama's timetable for withdrawal of American troops has evidently been joined by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Bush has mentioned a "time horizon," and John McCain has...

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Scalia Cites False Information in Habeas Corpus Dissent

Posted June 24, 2008 | 11:04 AM (EST)


To bolster his argument that the Guantánamo detainees should be denied the right to prove their innocence in federal courts, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in his dissent in Boumediene v. Bush: "At least 30 of those prisoners hitherto released from Guantánamo have returned to the battlefield." It turns out that...

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Hillary Invokes Assassination

Posted May 26, 2008 | 11:40 AM (EST)


For weeks, pundits have speculated about why Hillary Clinton insists on remaining in the primary race when Barack Obama has all but clinched the Democratic presidential nomination. On Friday, Clinton answered that question. It appears she's waiting in the wings for something dreadful to befall Obama.

When...

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The National Lawyers Guild Condemns Senate Grant of Immunity to Lawbreaking Telecommunications Companies

Posted February 16, 2008 | 05:06 PM (EST)


Responding to fear-mongering by the Bush administration, the Senate voted on February 12 to give retroactive immunity to the telecommunications companies that have turned over our telephone and Internet communications to the government. These companies have violated several laws, including the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), Title III, the Communications...

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Cheney Impeachment Gains Traction in House Judiciary Committee

Posted January 24, 2008 | 02:05 PM (EST)


Nine out of 23 Democratic members of the House Judiciary Committee favor starting impeachment hearings against Vice-President Dick Cheney. Six of the nine are co-sponsors of H.R. 799, which contains three articles of impeachment.

Articles I and II of H.R. 799 accuse Cheney of purposely manipulating intelligence to deceive...

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The Torture Tape Cover-Up: How High Does It Go?

Posted December 29, 2007 | 03:20 PM (EST)


When the hideous photographs of torture and abuse emerged from Abu Ghraib in the spring of 2004, they created a public relations disaster for the Bush administration. The White House had painstakingly worked to capitalize on the 9/11 attacks by creating a "war on terror." Never mind the absurdity of...

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