Rini Chakraborty is NEO Philanthropy’s Vice President of Four Freedoms Fund (FFF) and has been an integral part of the FFF team for over a decade, first serving as a Senior Program Officer and then Senior Director of Programs. Since she joined FFF in 2012, Rini launched and spearheaded a national grantmaking initiative focused on dramatically reducing enforcement, detention, deportation and the criminalization of immigrants. She also developed and led newer funding strategies, including the Texas Fund and Ending Child Detention & Family Separation initiative.
Rini’s career spans nearly three decades fighting for and advancing the rights of immigrants, communities of color, and low-wage workers striving to achieve justice. After passage of the 1996 immigration and welfare laws, she led a statewide immigrant rights collaborative in California, where she spearheaded successful legislative campaigns that restored health and welfare programs for immigrants, won in-state tuition for undocumented students, and helped propel the Golden State to be a national leader on immigrant justice. She also served as Senior Policy Analyst with the ACLU of Southern California, where she challenged post-9/11 policies and attacks against MASA (Muslim/Arab/South Asian) communities; and Executive Director of Sweatshop Watch, where she helped establish a consortium of national “sweat-free” cities and states. Prior to joining FFF, Rini was Amnesty International USA’s Western Regional Director, where she led campaigns on death penalty abolition, migrant rights, criminal justice reforms, and international human rights.
