Lisa Rubin

Lisa Rubin married lawyer Jon Oram in 2003. They have two daughters and live in New York City.

Oram is a partner in Proskauer's Sports Law Group. Rubin has described one of her daughters experiencing a difficult period around the time she reconsidered her legal career, a moment that contributed to her decision to leave private practice.

Rubin graduated from Stanford University in 1998 with a bachelor's degree in political science and a master's degree in organizational behavior. Two weeks after graduating, she moved to Washington, where she worked as a congressional aide for Senator Dianne Feinstein and Representative Nita Lowey.

She later earned her law degree from Yale Law School in 2004 and clerked for Judge Denise L. Cote of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Rubin then entered private practice in New York, working at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP.

Her corporate litigation career lasted more than a decade. She found the work demanding and often felt that writing briefs for senior lawyers to argue in court left her removed from the public-facing parts of litigation. During this period, she also served for more than 10 years on the board of Planned Parenthood of New York City.

Rubin left corporate law and joined the team behind The Rachel Maddow Show in 2019 as a legal consultant and producer. Rachel Maddow's producers recruited her for her litigation experience and ability to provide direct legal guidance, research, and reporting.

Rubin initially had no intention of appearing on camera. She valued the show's production meetings, which involved rapid questioning and requests for clear explanations of legal concepts. The experience later became preparation for her transition from off-air legal work to broadcast journalism.

When the show moved to a weekly format in 2022 and legal stories received less airtime during extensive coverage of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Rubin began writing for MSNBC.com. Her subjects included Ketanji Brown Jackson's Supreme Court confirmation hearings and the leak of the Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade.

Rubin began appearing on air in 2022 and became a regular MSNBC legal analyst during coverage of the E. Jean Carroll trials, Donald Trump's indictments, Supreme Court cases, and other high-profile legal proceedings. She later shifted from analysis to correspondence, reporting directly from courthouses and supplying firsthand observations for national audiences.

Her coverage of Trump's New York criminal trial brought particular attention to the details of a proceeding that was not televised. Rubin explained the legal issues while also describing courtroom behavior, testimony, and the atmosphere for viewers who could not watch the trial themselves.

She has appeared on programs including Deadline: White House with Nicolle Wallace, The ReidOut, Morning Joe, The Beat with Ari Melber, All In with Chris Hayes, and The Briefing with Jen Psaki. She was also featured in the television special Prosecuting Donald Trump: Witness to History.