About
Lawyer and activist who is best known as the co-founder of Direct Action Everywhere and The Simple Heart Initiative. He is known for leading teams that have rescued dozens of animals from factory farms, and has organized successful campaigns to ban fur in San Francisco and California. His work as an open rescue activist has been featured on The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and ABC's Nightline.
Before Fame
At 16, he attended DePaul University. He graduated from the University of Chicago in 2001 with a Bachelor's degree in political science. He received a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship to study economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but he went on leave after his first year to pursue a joint JD/PhD. He attended the University of Chicago Law School with a focus on behavioral law and economics.
Trivia
Prior to founding DxE, he was a lawyer with the law firms DLA Piper and Steptoe & Johnson and was a visiting assistant professor at the Northeastern University School of Law. He has served as lead counsel in two groundbreaking open rescue trials, in which activists were acquitted after being charged for removing animals from factory farms.
Family Life
His parents emigrated from Taiwan in the 1970s. His father did work involving vivisection for several years, which left a lasting impact on him and motivated him to become an animal rights activist. He has a dog anmed Oliver.
Associated With
He and Salva Dut are both activists.
