Education

J.D., University of Hawai’i Richardson School of Law

B.A., Sociology & Spanish, Brandeis University

Clerkships

Judge Marcia J. Waldorf (ret), First Circuit Court

Kirsha Kaulukane Milianani Durante

Litigation Director

Kirsha Kaulukane Milianani Durante serves as the Litigation Director at the Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation (NHLC), where she leads both the ʻOhana Services Team and the Lāhui Services Team. She joined NHLC in 2021 as Senior Staff Attorney and was promoted to Litigation Director in 2023.

Before joining NHLC, Kirsha spent sixteen years as a senior trial attorney at the Office of the Public Defender. She has tried over sixty jury cases, litigated more than a hundred trials and substantive motions, and argued before both the Intermediate Court of Appeals and the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court.

Kirsha is deeply engaged in the legal and Native Hawaiian communities. She serves on the Hawaiʻi State Bar Association’s Judicial Administration Committee, where she helps organize the Bench-Bar Conference and the Criminal Law Forum. She is also a director and Treasurer of the Native Hawaiian Bar Association, a board member of the Mālama Honua Public Charter School Foundation, and a gubernatorial appointee to the Defender Council.

In 2021, Kirsha completed the traditional rites of ʻūniki under Nā Kumu Hula Karl Veto Baker and Michael Lankakila Casupang of Hālau I Ka Wēkiu, attaining the rank of ʻōlapa.