Ann Beeson, a distinguished human rights advocate and litigator, joined the Open Society Institute in June 2007 as the director of U.S. Programs. She is working on the most acute challenges to open society in the United States, including race discrimination in the criminal justice system and immigration and national security policies that threaten human rights.

Prior to joining OSI, Beeson was associate legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. At the ACLU, she spearheaded groundbreaking initiatives to stop the erosion of civil liberties in the name of national security and to expand the use of international human rights strategies in the areas of immigrants' rights, women's rights, and racial justice.

Beeson has argued twice before the U.S. Supreme Court. In August 2006, she won an important ruling on behalf of prominent journalists, scholars, and attorneys challenging the National Security Agency's illegal surveillance of Americans without a warrant.

In June 2007, Beeson was named one of the 50 most influential women lawyers in America by the National Law Journal, and was also featured as one of American Lawyer magazine's 50 rising legal stars under the age of 45. She has published essays in two books, Liberty Under Attack and The War on Our Freedoms.

Beeson graduated from Emory University School of Law, where she was editor-in-chief of the Emory Law Journal. She is a Texas native, and holds a master's degree in cultural anthropology from the University of Texas.