Cyndie Chang is the Duane Morris Los Angeles Managing Partner and member of its Partners Board. Chang represents national and international businesses and litigates complex business and class action disputes. She advises and partners with clients to enforce their rights, resolve business challenges, mitigate exposure, and litigate their commercial disputes involving contracts, securities, licensing, products liability, product safety and recall, unfair competition, business torts and fraud, trademarks, trade secrets, insurance coverage, and real estate. Chang has obtained favorable results serving as first chair in jury and bench trials and arbitrations, and leading joint defense groups in complex cases. Her services have spanned various industries, including manufacturing, retail, fashion, consumer goods, financial services and banks, healthcare, insurance, cannabis, education, energy, utilities, telecommunications, auto and transportation.
She served as President of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association (NAPABA), representing more than 60,000 Asian American attorneys and 80 local, state and national bar associations. She led NAPABA during its advocacy efforts and amicus briefs to SCOTUS on immigration issues and initiated programs for minority women in the profession and lawyers’ self-care/mental health. She was also President of the Southern California Chinese Lawyers Association, which awarded her its inaugural Trailblazer award based on achievements in her legal career, championing of issues affecting immigrants and other marginalized communities, and overall dedication to the APA community. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for Loyola Law School, LA and received its Board of Governors Grand Reunion alumni award, and serves as a board member of the National Association of Women Lawyers. She was a Commissioner on the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession and a board member of the Asian Pacific Community Fund, which helps fund Los Angeles API non-profits.
Chang has been recognized with the “Super Lawyers” distinction for many years, including Top 50 Women of Southern California and the Daily Journal’s Top 100 California Women Lawyers. Her honors include: NAPABA’s 2010 Best Lawyers Under 40; Council on Legal Education Opportunity (CLEO) inaugural EDGE Greater Equality Award; inaugural fellow to the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD); Asian Americans Advancing Justice LA Pro Bono Award; a LA Times “DEIA Visionary”; one of Los Angeles Business Journal’s “Most Influential Minority Lawyers,” “Champion of Women Finalist,” “Community Impact Award Finalist,” “Most Influential Women Lawyers,” and “Leader in Law”; The Recorder’s “Lawyer on the Fast Track;” Minority Corporate Counsel Association’s (MCCA) “Rising Star”, and one of 15 women profiled in Best Lawyers Magazine in 2016 as leading the charge for achievements in the practice and policy on both local and national levels. She is an elected member of the Chancery Club (Los Angeles’ association of distinguished lawyers who have held position of honor and responsibility in legal, judicial, academic, governmental and civic organizations) and serves on the Joint Committee of Law Firm Partners and Corporate Counsel for the National Judicial College (NJC). Ms. Chang is a Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America, a trial lawyer honorary society composed of less than one-half of one percent of American lawyers, and a Fellow to the American Bar Foundation. Ms. Chang previously served as judicial extern to the Honorable Stephen Reinhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Chang has led high profile pro bono impact litigation for national non-profits, on issues concerning reproductive justice, racial profiling, and immigrant business rights. Specifically, on behalf of Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles, she advocated and challenged the constitutionality of a proposed ordinance that could have restricted the use of Asian characters on business signs in the City of Monterey Park, California. She was featured in, “An Asian American Family’s Story of intergenerational Courage,” by AARP and “Opening the Door: Personal Stories of Groundbreaking Los Angeles Lawyers and Judges” for LA Law Library’s Pro Bono Week, sponsored by Cal Humanities. Ms. Chang has also been featured in the Los Angeles Business Journal, Above the Law, Ms. JD, The American Lawyer, the ABA Journal, Best Lawyers, Diversity Journal, the LA times, Diversity Executive, the Daily Journal and other legal publications. She is a frequent speaker and presenter at numerous national and local professional, bar association, and community events.
