MAYA RAGSDALE

About Maya

Maya founded Beyond the Bars in 2020, beginning with weekly meetings for women with loved ones incarcerated in Miami jails and growing the organization into a leading worker center building power with formerly incarcerated workers across South Florida. She brings to Beyond the Bars deep experience as a lawyer, organizer, and movement strategist, shaped by both her personal experiences with the carceral system and her professional background representing low-wage workers as a public defender in Miami, Florida and the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, as well as a legal aid attorney.

Prior to founding Beyond the Bars, Maya served as Chief Counsel at Worth Rises, where she challenged the prison industry through regulatory, procurement, and policy advocacy aimed at dismantling profit-driven incarceration. She is deeply embedded in Miami’s movement ecosystem and national labor and justice networks, and has played a key role in building infrastructure to support systems-impacted workers and families through coordinated legal, policy, and organizing strategies.

Maya’s leadership has been recognized nationally. She was named a 2025 Aspen Institute Job Quality Fellow and has been supported by fellowships from Galaxy Gives, Law for Black Lives, and Justice Catalyst. She is also a recipient of the Health Foundation of South Florida’s 2023 Women in Health Award and Miami New Times’s 2020 Best Activist Award. Maya holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a B.A. from the University of Michigan.