From 2008 to 2010, David Tracey ’13 worked as a community organizer for Community Pride, an offshoot of Harlem Children’s Zone, working with tenants to improve housing conditions, advocating for gun reform, and campaigning for greater resources in the neighborhood.
“I had developed this passion for social justice work,” he says. “But after a few years organizing, I began to think about how litigation could be used as a tool in service of those same goals.”
Today, Tracey is managing partner of the public interest law firm Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight LLP and co-chair of its public interest litigation practice group. In a little over a decade at Sanford Heisler, Tracey has focused on cases of workplace discrimination and retaliation in addition to suits over unpaid wages and benefits—for example, achieving a $13.75 million settlement in 2021 as co-counsel in a class action on behalf of some 195,000 claimants who charged that pharmacy chain Walgreens had mishandled its 401(k) plan. This year the National Law Journal named Tracey one of its “Rising Stars of the Plaintiffs Bar.”
In this Q&A, Tracey reflects on his time at NYU Law, weighs in on the growing concerns over AI-fueled discrimination in the workplace, and shares why civil rights is indelibly linked to workers’ rights.
Given the type of cases that you handle, how do you assess the state of civil rights in this country?
I don’t think civil rights is an issue that will ever go away for us. It transforms in certain ways over time, and in some ways, it doesn’t. I’ve had cases where people have said and done truly outrageous things that one would hope the Civil Rights Act of 1964 had clearly outlawed. Cases that just basically make you scratch your head and wonder, “Where have you been for the past 60 years?” And I’ve had other cases that involve new technology and new manifestations of civil rights abuses, including with allegations of algorithmic bias. We’re seeing new technologies that are potentially incorporating the systemic biases that have long existed in our society and economy. Civil rights as an issue will remain ever-present, because these problems are so deeply ingrained in our society.
Do you believe that the laws have kept up with newer forms of discrimination, particularly the risk of AI-driven bias?
Laws can always be improved. And laws can always be tailored to specific technologies as necessary. But I’m in the camp that firmly believes that current law is suited to remedy violations of anti-discrimination laws caused by AI. One of the great challenges with addressing this is not so much the legal framework or of proving violations, but that we don’t have adequate disclosure. So, it can be very hard, for example, for job applicants to know whether or not an algorithm has weeded them out, and why. We need more disclosure laws, so that employees, job applicants, housing applicants, and consumers know when they’re being subjected to algorithmic tools and have some information about what those tools are, how they work, and what the impact is on their rights.
What sparked your interest in civil rights?
My parents raised me with certain values in terms of the importance of equality. And I had grandparents who escaped the Nazi’s, which I believe instilled in me at a very young age the importance of treating everyone equally, regardless of their background. That was something that I grew up with and felt viscerally. But over time, as I met people, as I talked with people, and I learned from classmates and peers and colleagues, it increasingly reinforced in me the importance of civil rights and the need to address the ways in which inequality and discrimination so dramatically impact our society.
Why did you choose NYU Law, and how did your time at NYU Law prepare you for what you’re doing now?
NYU Law had a reputation for being a school that attracted law students who have a passion for public service. The public interest component was undoubtedly the number one thing that attracted me. But at NYU, I began to learn more about and focus more specifically on civil rights in the employment space. I learned that there was such a great need for, and so many lawyers were doing, this type of work that it drew me to this particular field of practice.
Overall, at NYU, I was so impressed with the quality of teaching and the professors’ commitment to their students. I actually had Dean [Troy] McKenzie as my Civil Procedure professor, and it was a wonderful class. He was great at getting students engaged with the law. The quality of instruction helped me to develop an appreciation for the law that I didn’t know that I would have when I enrolled. And the clinics at NYU Law provided such a wonderful opportunity for students to start developing their skills and to be exposed to different areas of the law while still in school.
With the cases that you’ve had so far, is there an experience that stands out to you?
When I started at the firm ten years ago, we had numerous cases against pharmaceutical companies that were combined collective and class actions, all involving claims of gender discrimination. Each of those cases included an opt-in procedure, where employees could elect to join the collective action. During discovery, many of those employees were deposed. And as a young lawyer, I was put on a plane and taken around the country—to Iowa to Wisconsin to Texas to California—to help defend these female employees’ depositions. One of the things that I felt was so moving was that female employees at the same company—who did not know each other and were in different parts of the country—all recounted in their depositions extremely similarly stories of how they suffered discrimination.
Those cases really stand out to me as my initiation to the world of civil rights and employment discrimination. You got a sense that by helping employees assert their rights, you were telling a larger story of discrimination that’s happening at the company, in the industry, and in society. It was really inspiring to be a part of telling that story.
And what has surprised you the most in doing this work?
That I ended up doing workers’ rights cases outside the realm of anti-discrimination law, such as ensuring that employees receive their appropriate pay. I didn’t know when I started that I would necessarily be branching out.
Now I’m doing all types of workers’ rights [cases] in addition to civil rights. But they both really complement one another. They have always been intimately related. I mean, if you think about the history of this country, there’s really no way of disentangling civil rights from the workplace, because many civil rights violations have had to do with the exploitation of labor. And the abuses of power that often occur in civil rights cases are deeply connected to the kinds of abuses of power that we’ve seen in workers’ rights cases. I think that understanding that they are both connected gives me even more tools at my disposal.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
Posted November 25, 2024