Campaign website found for Griselda Vega Samuel

A campaign website has been launched in support of the 14th Subcircuit candidacy of Griselda Vega Samuel. That's a link to the campaign website in the preceding sentence; a link has also been added to the Sidebar on this site.

Licensed to practice law in Illinois since 2008, according to ARDC, Vega Samuel became became Midwest Regional Counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund in 2018.

A brief digression here: I'm reporting the candidate's surname as Vega Samuel. The campaign website and MALDEF press release linked in the preceding paragraph refer to the candidate merely as "Griselda." This is accurate, certainly, but not helpful: If elected, the nameplate on the bench will almost certainly not read "Judge Griselda." ARDC sees Vega as a middle name... as in Samuel, Griselda Vega. That is how I've alphabetized it in the candidate list; I try never to contradict ARDC. But, pending an authoritative ruling on the candidate's preferences, I'll continue to use Vega Samuel here. End of digression.

Vega Samuel was born and raised in Rogers Park, according to her campaign biography; she now resides in McKinley Park. She is a first-generation American, and the first in her family to go to college and get a graduate degree. Vega Samuel did her undergraduate work Briar Cliff University, a Jesuit college in Sioux City, Iowa. While still an undergraduate, Vega Samuel worked as an intern for St. Sen. Miguel del Valle. After graduation, but before returning to law school (at the University of Iowa), Vega Samuel worked as an Assistant Development Director at the National Mexican Museum of Art.

A winner of the CBA's Vanguard Award (in 2022), Vega Samuel has also been honored with several other awards, including the Hispanic Lawyers Association of Illinois Latina Lawyer of the Year Award in 2019, according to her campaign website. She began her legal career with Columbia Legal Services in Yakima, Washington, working on an employment class action lawsuit, Perez-Farias v. Global Horizons, Inc., representing Mexican farmworkers in a discrimination, and other state and federal employment violations against multiple growers. Later, after returning to Chicago, Vega Samuel worked for the Legal Assistance Foundation of Chicago, assisting Latina women in domestic violence situations with emergency orders of protection, divorce and custody issues.

This is Vega Samuel's first campaign for election to the bench.