Focus

Kathleen "Kate" Konopka joined ClientEarth Americas in April 2026 as its Lead Attorney for Strategic Programs. In this capacity, she co-manages the legal work and team focused on US litigation to hold corporate actors accountable for environmental impacts in the United States, Latin America, and the Caribbean.    

Experience

Previously, Ms. Konopka served as Legal Director for the Global Health Advocacy Incubator where she led a team of international attorneys in advocacy and litigation to advance and protect public health policies and to hold health-harming industries accountable in 30 countries around the world. She has also served as Deputy Attorney General for the District of Columbia, where she oversaw an 80 person team and the affirmative civil portfolio, including consumer protection, antitrust, housing and environmental enforcement, federal overreach, and civil and workers’ rights. She also has served as Senior Enforcement Counsel in the Social Justice Division for the New York Attorney General, as a senior litigator in both the Antitrust Division and the Consumer Protection Branch of the US Department of Justice, and as Counsel in two national plaintiff-side class action law firms.  

Ms. Konopka began her career as law clerk to the Honorable Nan R. Shuker on the DC Superior Court, followed by service as an Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia in both the criminal and civil divisions. She has spoken on issues of antitrust, administrative, constitutional, consumer protection, and human rights law and on the power of strategic litigation at events hosted by the DC Bar, the American Bar Association, the American Antitrust Institute, DC Superior Court Judicial Training, Georgetown University, the University of Sydney, and  at GHAI events in Indonesia and Kenya, and Morocco.

Education

Ms. Konopka graduated from Vassar College with a degree in Women's Studies and received her law degree from Northeastern University School of Law.

Ms. Konopka is based in Washington, DC, and is barred in DC and NY.