Sambhav (Sam) Sankar is Earthjustice’s Senior Vice President for Programs. He leads the development of Earthjustice’s strategies for carrying out its mission, and coordinates the work of our Litigation, Communications, and Policy and Legislation departments.

Sam has been working on environmental issues throughout his career, which has included service as an engineer at Superfund sites, a senior executive at General Electric, an attorney at the Justice Department, and counsel to the presidential commission that investigated the Deepwater Horizon spill. (Along the way, he also worked as a boat captain and a machinist.)

As a litigator, Sam has argued civil and criminal cases involving the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, Magnuson-Stevens Act, CERCLA, FIFRA, RCRA, and NEPA. He has also argued cases arising under adjacent laws like the Federal Oil and Gas Royalty Management Act and Offshore Continental Lands Act.

Sam has environmental engineering degrees from Cornell and Stanford, and a J.D. from Berkeley Law. After law school, he clerked for Judge William Fletcher of the Ninth Circuit, Judge Louis Pollak of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and Justice Sandra Day O’Connor of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Sam lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife and two children.

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