Gabriela D. Lemus, Ph.D., Vice-Chair

Dr. Gabriela D. Lemus is the co-founder of the National Latino Coalition on Climate Change (NLCCC) and presently serves as its Vice-Chair.

Lemus is the first woman to hold the position of Executive Director at the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA). Dr. Lemus is also Vice-Chair of the National Hispanic Leadership Agenda (NHLA), an entity comprised of 26 leading national and regional Hispanic organizations, formed to present a platform on the major issues facing the Latino community and the nation as a whole.

Prior to her work with LCLAA, she was Director of Policy and Legislation at the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). Prior to her work at LULAC, Dr. Lemus was an adjunct professor at the University of Memphis, San Diego State University, and the University of San Diego. While at LULAC, Dr. Lemus founded the LULAC Democracy Initiative Voter Project, a national Hispanic civic participation campaign focused on voter education, registration and get-out-the-vote.

Currently, in her work at LCLAA, Dr. Lemus advocates for Latino workers and families, with a specific focus on issues related to globalization, trade, and immigration; U.S.-Latin American relations, and ending border militarization and vigilantism among others. She is the founder of Latinos for a Secure Retirement - a campaign to fight the privatization of Social Security and has begun ground-breaking work on universal health care reform, climate change and job growth.

Under both the Clinton and Bush administrations, she was invited to travel to Nicaragua and Argentina to promote democracy and civil society participation.

Dr. Lemus is a Commissioner on the recently launched Commission to Engage African Americans on Climate Change (CEAC). She also serves on the Board of the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) and the United States Labor Education in the Americas Project (USLEAP).

Dr. Lemus has been an outspoken advocate for Latino issues appearing in both English and Spanish language media outlets, including CNN, CNN en Espanol, NBC's Hardball, Fox's Neil Cavuto, Univision and NBC-Telemundo among others.

She received her doctorate in International Relations from the University of Miami in 1998.