Alum Leads Efforts To Secure $5M Fund for Women’s Soccer Players

University of Virginia School of Law alum Jess Feinberg ’21 served as lead attorney for an investigation into allegations that National Women’s Soccer League players were subjected to a hostile work environment — an effort that recently resulted in a $5 million settlement.

The investigation concluded that abuse and sexual misconduct were systemic across the league. Players endured unwanted sexual advances, intimidation, emotional abuse, and coercion from various coaches and staff. The settlement, announced in early February, established a victims’ fund and required the implementation of reforms to address widespread instances of sexual coercion, racism and other abuse.

For Feinberg, an assistant attorney general with the Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia, the successful resolution of the case served as a “great reminder of why we do the kind of work that we do.”

“Most of these players are not in a [financial] position to afford long-term litigation,” she said. “To be able to leverage the weight of the government on behalf of individuals … is not only immensely rewarding, but our duty as government attorneys.”

Feinberg grew up in Palo Alto, California. Law runs in the family: She is the daughter of a paralegal and an intellectual property attorney, and her grandfather served on the California Court of Appeals.

“When I was younger, I had no interest in doing the type of law that my dad practices or, frankly, in the hours that he was working,” she said. “But in college it became clear to me that with my combination of skills and interests, going into law was the best way I could do good on behalf of others.”

Majoring in sociology at Smith College helped her decide to become a civil rights lawyer. After searching for a law school with a similarly collegial atmosphere and committed alumni community, she was happy to find it at UVA Law.

She wasted no time becoming active in the student community, serving as a Peer Advisor, president of the Lambda Law Alliance, and membership and inclusion editor of the Virginia Law Review, in addition to becoming involved with Virginia Law Women and the Community Fellows Program. Feinberg was a Karsh-Dillard Scholar and received a Katherine and David deWilde ’67 Public Interest Summer Fellowship for her 2L summer and, as a 3L, UVA Law’s National Association of Women Lawyers Award.

As a law student, Feinberg interned for the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division in its Disability Rights Section, and for Muslim Advocates. She participated in the Legal Aid Justice Center’s Civil Rights Clinic and completed UVA Law’s Pro Bono Challenge through her work for Lambda Legal and the Rutherford Institute. Feinberg also assisted with the prosecution of James Fields Jr., who killed Heather Heyer and injured dozens with his car in Charlottesville on Aug. 12, 2017, by identifying video and audio clips that were played for the jury in court.

In her final semester of law school, Feinberg was awarded the Charles F.C. Ruff Fellowship, which provides one outgoing UVA Law student the opportunity to serve as an attorney with the D.C. Attorney General’s Office in a one-year position. She felt “incredibly lucky” to receive an offer as a trial attorney after the fellowship ended.

The NWSL investigation had begun just one month before she started work in October 2021, when players from across the NWSL, including on the Washington Spirit, went public with allegations of misconduct and abuse from coaches and officials over a period of 10-plus years. Knowing that Feinberg was interested in women’s rights and women’s sports — particularly soccer — her boss, Alicia M. Lendon, asked if she would be interested in taking on the case.

She said she was grateful to her supervisors for giving her the opportunity to lead negotiations, because “their demonstration of faith in me meant a lot, and it’s incredible that I’m in my 20s and am able to say I did that.”

The work began with a review of documents released in response to a subpoena filed by the attorney general in September 2021.

Feinberg singlehandedly performed all of the document review, drew up timelines and made recommendations, then waited for the release of two commissioned reports — one ­by the U.S. Soccer Federation and one jointly by the National Women’s Soccer League and the National Women’s Soccer League Players Association — so she could compare their findings with hers.

In response to the reports, the states of New York and Illinois (where the NWSL was headquartered during the years in question) sent a joint letter initiating their own investigation to ensure accountability, transparency and respectful treatment of players.

“My office realized that if we partnered with these two states, we had the opportunity to make a bigger impact,” she said. “Luckily, New York and Illinois were game, so we approached the league, and the rest is history.”

Feinberg and her colleagues sent countless emails and participated in upwards of 50 hours of meetings to negotiate for the fund and reforms they felt the players were owed.

“We wanted to make sure we were getting the players as many protections as possible, because they had already done a tremendous amount of advocacy themselves,” she said.

Working to secure those safeguards felt both critically important and challenging, particularly at this early stage in her career.

“At the time, I couldn’t believe I was being allowed to lead most of the negotiations,” she said. “It was very nerve-wracking, especially in the beginning, but it helped to grow my confidence a lot.”

She credits the professors she worked with at UVA Law for learning how to manage work-related anxiety.

“I felt very supported as a student. If I hadn’t had professors who believed in me so fully, I think it would have been a lot more difficult to overcome the stress,” she said.

She also appreciated being able to unwind with fellow alums living in D.C. in her off hours.

“Even though they couldn’t know what I was working on, just being able to spend time with them, lean on them and commiserate about working hours and those kinds of things meant a lot to me,” she said.

Feinberg has been a season ticket holder to the Washington Spirit women’s soccer team since last season, and her seats are with four other UVA Law alums: Sam Pickett ’21, Maria Luevano ’21, Janice Johnson ’20 and Hanaa Khan ’20. Recent alumni have joined them for games as well.

“It was really exciting to finally be able to tell them what I had been working on,” she said.

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