Leslie Gilbert-Lurie

Leslie Gilbert-Lurie is a lawyer, author, philanthropist, community leader, and former television executive. In 2022, she was appointed by California Governor Gavin Newsom to the California State University Board of Trustees. The California State University system is the largest public University system in the United States.

Leslie is a member of the UCLA Foundation Board of Directors, and the Board of Advisors to the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and the UCLA School of Law. She served for over a decade on the Los Angeles County Board of Education, and was President of the Board for three terms.

As a Founding Board Member and past Board Chair of the Alliance for Children’s Rights, she has been instrumental in guiding a leading legal rights organization for abused, at-risk, and foster youth. Leslie also served as the Vice-Chair of the Los Angeles Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Welfare.

Gilbert-Lurie’s Holocaust memoir, Bending Toward the Sun, documents her mother’s experience in the Holocaust and the intergenerational transmission of trauma. She has spoken in a variety of countries and across the US about the book, the Holocaust, and its implications for the world.

Leslie is an active member, and previously the Co-Chair, of HRW’s Los Angeles Committee. She also is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy Board of Directors.

Gilbert-Lurie spent her earlier career as a television executive at NBC, where she oversaw NBC Productions and the comedy division, co-wrote television episodes for Alf and Saved by the Bell, and co-founded an in-house production company, Lurie- Horwits Productions. She later consulted for USA Network and Disney Television. As a lawyer, Leslie worked at the law firm of Manatt, Phelps, Rothenberg and Tunney, and she served as a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Law Clerk for Judge Harry Pregerson.