Ruth Botstein joined the ACLU in 2022. Ruth has more than 20 years of experience litigating complex civil cases before the state and federal courts in Alaska. She has worked in private practice at the small firm Feldman & Orlansky, served as an Assistant Attorney General and Senior Assistant Attorney General for the State of Alaska, and worked as an Assistant Municipal Attorney for the Municipality of Anchorage. Ruth has extensive trial and appellate experience, including two arguments before the United States Supreme Court. She is admitted to practice law in Alaska, California (currently inactive), the United States District Court for the District of Alaska, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court.
Ruth attended Oberlin College and Stanford Law School, where she graduated with distinction and served as an Executive Editor of the Stanford Law Review. She moved to Alaska in 1998 to clerk on the Alaska Supreme Court for Hon. Dana Fabe. Although she was expecting her Alaska adventure to last only one year, instead she fell in love with the beauty, expanse, and people of the state and has lived here ever since.
Ruth is driven to improve the lives of all Alaskans by working to ensure that all levels and branches of government honor their constitutional and legal promises to guarantee civil rights and freedoms, treat all citizens fairly and equally, and conduct government business with honesty, transparency, responsiveness, accountability, equity, and fairness.
Ruth lives and works in Anchorage on the traditional homeland of the Dena’ina Peoples. She is a mom of two kids and enjoys camping, singing, science fiction, and taking Waffles the dog to the park.