The National Lawyers Guild Mass Defense Program is a network of activists, community members, organizers, legal workers, law students, and lawyers providing legal support for protests and movements taking an abolitionist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, and anti-imperialist approach to human rights work.

The Mass Defense Program is a network of activists, community members, organizers, legal workers, law students, and lawyers providing legal support for protests and movements fighting for progressive social change. Members across the country provide Know-Your-Rights and Legal Observer® trainings, assistance in setting up temporary legal offices and legal support structures, Legal Observer® coverage during protest events, materials for supporting activists engaged in mass protests, and more.

Over the decades we’ve been working to protect protesters on the streets and in the courtrooms, we’ve aided countless movements in their work toward justice, from the anti-war protests of the 1960s, Occupy Wall Street in 2012, and the protests for Black lives in the summer of 2020, the NLG has responded to calls from organizers and activists to provide crucial legal support to leftist movements. Our Mass Defense program is a vital part of our work; as an organization created to offer often gatekept skills and strategies in service of peoples’ movements, carrying out rapid response, on-the-ground support to protesters is something we’re extremely proud to do.

Mass Defense Resources

Whether you’re leading a long-standing legal observing program with the NLG or just getting started, we strongly urge Legal Observers® (LOs), LO coordinators, supervising attorneys, and others involved with NLG Mass Defense to make sure to familiarize themselves with the following resources. Anti-oppression work is fundamental to the mission of the NLG, and effective Mass Defense needs to incorporate anti-oppression to our on-the-ground rapid response. It is also important that these materials are incorporated into how we treat one another, as privilege and power do not disappear in our relationships (interpersonal and systemic) in the NLG.

Legal Observer Program

Responsive Guides

Protest Tools

Know Your Risks (KYRs)

Anti-Oppression Resources

Support Our Work

Our Mass Defense work is run largely by volunteers who care deeply about their communities and comrades. Our ultimate goal is to be responsive to the needs of the moment, and we strive to follow the leadership of movement organizers. Because of this, our membership is extremely important to us, and integral to our ability to continue offering support to movements for justice. If you’d like to become a member of the NLG, please visit our join page to be linked to your local chapter.

Our Mass Defense work is funded by a matching grant from the CS Fund and relies on contributions from NLG members and supporters. So that we can sustain this critical work, please click the button below to donate! Your contribution will go toward:

Train Legal Observers® to monitor police at protests
Expand our outreach to BIPOC, Muslim, and immigrant communities
Provide Know Your Rights booklets and trainings
Enhance NLG Litigation Support
Fund our Director of Mass Defense position

Donate to the Mass Defense Program

See below for some photos of events, programs, and actions we’ve worked on!