Mai Chao is an associate attorney and a member of the firm’s employment, immigration, and family law practice groups. She assists her business clients with securing temporary work visas for foreign employees such as H‑1B, TN, and O, and navigating the PERM labor certification process. She counsels public and private employers on work authorization compliance and other personnel matters. Mai Chao handles intersecting legal issues involving family and immigration law such as securing predicate state court orders for Special Immigrant Juvenile petitions. In her family law practice, she represents clients in several areas, including adoptions, divorce, property division, child custody, and placement disputes in all dispute-resolution options: collaborative, mediation, and traditional litigation.
Prior to joining Boardman Clark, Mai Chao was a civil litigator with a Madison law firm focusing on family law and consumer protection matters at state, federal, and appellate levels. She previously was a judicial intern at the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Mai Chao is fluent in both oral and written Hmong.
Admitted to Practice
- Wisconsin State Courts
- United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin
- United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin
Honors & Recognition
- Selected to The Wisconsin Super Lawyers: Rising Stars® list, 2023-Present
- American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers Scholarship, 2017
See our disclaimer regarding third-party awards.
Professional Memberships
- American Immigration Lawyers Association
- Collaborative Family Law Council of Wisconsin
- Dane County Bar Association, Family Law Assistance Center, Volunteer
- Legal Association for Women
Education
- J.D., University of Wisconsin Law School, 2017
- B.A., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2013
- Powers-Knapp Scholar
Mai Chao’s Latest Writing & Presentations
Arrest Record Discrimination Includes Protections for Records of Civil Forfeitures
HR Heads Up | 04.16.25
Employers are significantly restricted under the Wisconsin Fair Employment Act in how they may use an individual’s “arrest record” to make an employment decision. Recently, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled that arrest record discrimination covers arrest records related to non-criminal as well as criminal offenses.