D’Lonra Ellis oversees day-to-day legal matters for both the Earthquakes and Major League Baseball’s Oakland A’s and has served as the club’s Chief Legal Officer since June 2022.
She is responsible for corporate governance, labor and employment, intellectual property, commercial transactions, and litigation matters. She also oversees all legal aspects of real estate acquisition, entitlement, and development efforts. She was integral in the launch of Earthquakes II as part of MLS NEXT Pro.
Ellis previously served as the general counsel of Aspire Public Schools, a nonprofit charter management organization that serves over 15,000 students throughout California. She has additional experience as a director and senior corporate counsel in the intellectual property, marketing, and advertising group at Gap, Inc., and as an associate in the litigation practice of Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk and Rabkin, now known as Arnold & Porter.
Ellis is an Adjunct Professor at UC Hastings College of Law, where she teaches sports law and the corporate counsel externship program. She sits on the Board of Directors of Bay Area Legal Aid, which provides legal services to low-income residents in seven Bay Area counties; the Board of Directors of KIPP Northern California Public Schools, which serves over 6,000 students in seven Northern California cities; and the Board of Directors of Seven Stories Institute, which runs a nonprofit bookstore collective in the Washington Heights neighborhood of New York City. She is a member of the Alameda County Bar Association and Golden Gate Chapter of Lambda Alpha International. She received her BA in Architecture, Preservation, and Planning from Columbia University and her JD from Stanford Law School.