Drake Hagner

Drake Hagner is a Visiting Associate Professor of Clinical Law and Director of the Health Rights Law Clinic. In the clinic, Professor Hagner teaches weekly seminar classes and closely supervises students as they represent real clients with Medicaid and other public benefit legal needs. In partnership with a local community-based provider of mental health services, Professor Hagner and her students aim to meet patients’ civil legal needs and reduce the social factors that contribute to poor health. 

Professor Hagner is an expert in publicly funded medical assistance programs, including Medicaid, and other safety-net benefit programs, including unemployment insurance, Supplemental Security Income, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Her research explores the gap between the relatively strong procedural due process protections in the law and the reality of beneficiaries’ experiences as they seek to obtain and hold on to their benefits. Professor Hagner presented her current research on procedural due process failures in the administration of COVID-19 pandemic-related unemployment benefits at the 2023 Poverty Law Conference and 2023 AALS Clinicians Conference. Prior to her appointment at GW Law, Professor Hagner taught Legal Ethics at American University’s Washington College of Law as an Adjunct Professorial Lecturer. 

Professor Hagner has represented low-income individuals in a wide range of health law and public benefit matters for more than a decade.  Prior to her appointment at GW Law, Professor Hagner was a Supervising Attorney at the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia.  From 2020-22, she chaired the DC Consortium of Legal Services Providers’ COVID-19 Workers’ Rights Committee and led advocacy efforts on behalf of jobless workers before government leaders and the Council of the District of Columbia. She began her public interest career as an Equal Justice Works fellow.

Professor Hagner holds a BA from Vassar College and a JD from Georgetown Law.  She served as Editor-in-Chief for The Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law during law school. After graduating, she clerked for the Honorable Magistrate Judge Alan Kay (now retired) of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia.