Kathrina (Kasia) Szymborski Wolfkot is senior counsel and manager in the Brennan Center’s Judiciary Program, where she works to realize a fair and inclusive judicial system that protects fundamental rights, democratic values, and the rule of law. She is the managing editor of State Court Report, a Brennan Center publication focused on state courts and state constitutional law. She also teaches state constitutional law at NYU School of Law.
Wolfkot has been featured in national media outlets including The New York Times, Crooked Media’s Strict Scrutiny, Slate, The Guardian, The Nation, Business Insider, and Law360.
Wolfkot previously worked as an appellate attorney at the MacArthur Justice Center. In that role, she challenged inhumane conditions, poor medical care, and violence in jails and prisons across the country, as well as excessive and wrongful sentences. She developed a robust state constitutional practice, focusing on state constitutional antipunishment provisions to protect and expand the rights of incarcerated people.
Before that, Wolfkot worked at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP, where she managed the firm’s pro bono clemency and parole projects. She secured multiple sentence commutations from New York’s governor for individuals serving decades-long sentences and obtained parole release for several people sentenced to life in prison.
Wolfkot is a graduate of Skidmore College and the University of Michigan Law School. She clerked for Judge Carl E. Stewart of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Prior to law school, Wolfkot worked as a journalist in Moscow, Russia.
