Tom Jawetz, Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs

 As a Liman Fellow, I worked with the Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project (the “IRR Project”) of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs (the “Washington Lawyers’ Committee”) in Washington, D.C. My fellowship project began as an effort to design and implement a weekly legal orientation and screening program to benefit pro se respondents facing deportation. I coordinated my efforts with the local Immigration Court, members of the public interest community, and private immigration practitioners. I also represented several indigent individuals who fled persecution and sought asylum in the United States, and submitted public comments in response to a regulatory change affecting asylum seekers. For the final four months of my fellowship, I served as the acting director of the IRR Project, assisting the Washington Lawyers’ Committee with fundraising proposals, and participating in a broad range of litigation and policy matters.

For over 35 years, the Washington Lawyers’ Committee has represented both individuals and groups seeking to vindicate their civil rights. It has handled over 5,000 civil rights cases, in employment, housing, public accommodations, and other aspects of urban life. The IRR Project of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee was created in 1978, since which time it has been fighting to protect the rights of immigrants and refugees. The IRR Project coordinates training sessions on asylum law and procedures for pro bono attorneys under the D.C. Bar Pro Bono Program, and refers cases to volunteer attorneys who represent clients in immigration proceedings. The IRR Project also advocates for fair and equitable immigration laws and policies.

In my mid-year report, I noted the progress I had made in creating the Arlington Immigration Court Legal Orientation and Screening Program (the “Program”). The goals of the Program were to (a) provide pro se respondents at the Arlington Immigration Court with a legal orientation to the removal process, and (b) identify individuals who possess potentially meritorious claims in order to find them representation. In designing the Program, I met with numerous immigration advocates in the public interest community as well as members of the private bar who coordinate pro bono representation. I also spoke with individuals in Miami, Philadelphia, and San Francisco to learn about how pro bono programs work in those cities, and participated in one day of screening in New York, where a similar project has been operating successfully since 1992. The first screenings took place on Thursday, April 21, and representatives of the Program appeared at the immigration court every Thursday thereafter.

Through the Program, I identified numerous individuals who possessed bona fide defenses to removal, but insufficient resources to hire private counsel. In many of those cases, I was able to secure representation for those individuals on a pro bono or reduced fee basis. One case involved a 14-year-old girl from El Salvador who entered the United States unlawfully to join her father. The young girl’s mother had abandoned her when she was a toddler, and the person who had cared for her since then—her grandfather—passed away several years ago. Although she was not eligible for any relief from removal, I worked with a volunteer attorney from a private law firm to request that the Department of Homeland Security exercise prosecutorial discretion in the young girl’s favor. The request was based not only on her age and her lack of family in El Salvador, but also on the fact that her father had been a lawful permanent resident in the United States (i.e., a green card holder) for over two decades, and is prima facie eligible to apply for citizenship. After negotiating with the local Chief Counsel for the Department of Homeland Security, I was able to get removal proceedings against my client administratively closed, which will permit her to remain with her father until she is able to normalize her immigration status through her father. In the meantime, she will be able to attend a local high school, and will not have to return to El Salvador where there is no one to care for her.

I have previously reported on my representation of a young woman from Gabon who was seeking asylum at the Arlington Immigration Court. Because she had expressed a fear of returning to Gabon when she attempted to enter the United States at the airport, my client was placed in detention and was held at a regional jail in Virginia. After spending five months in the facility, she was released when my request for parole was granted by the Department of Homeland Security, and I was able to raise $1500 for her bond. I subsequently appeared in immigration court and succeeded in obtaining withholding of removal for her. Working with an intern for the IRR Project, I also represented a young man from Haiti who fled after being kidnapped and left for dead by members of an armed gang. Although the Asylum Office has not yet made a final decision in the case, I am hopeful that my client will be granted asylum in the near future, and will be able to return to school.

In designing the Program, I had hoped to develop a model that would be able to outlast my fellowship. After appearing for several Thursday screening sessions, I noticed that relatively few respondents were showing up to the presentations. In an effort to further promote the Program and increase the attendance rate, I adjusted my fellowship by appearing in court on a regular basis to sit through Master calendar hearings. In doing so, I made a surprising discovery: one of the main reasons that few people were attending the weekly screenings was that relatively few non-detained respondents appeared at the Arlington Immigration Court without counsel. I presented my findings to court personnel and local advocates, who were equally surprised to learn about the high representation rate. As a result, although the Program functioned smoothly, and helped some individuals find representation, the Program will not be continued by the Washington Lawyers’ Committee. Even with the benefit of hindsight, I am still not sure what I could have done differently to make this aspect of my project a greater success. The idea for the project came from individuals in the local public interest community as well as members of the Executive Office for Immigration Review which oversees the country’s immigration courts.

The need that my project was designed to meet was widely believed to be much larger than it actually was. One possible explanation for this misperception is that those individuals who may have previously appeared in immigration court without representation have increasingly decided not to attend their court hearings. Several people affiliated with the Arlington Immigration Court have suggested that the high representation rate for individuals who appear for their hearings may be related to a recent increase in the issuance of in absentia removal orders (i.e., removal orders that are issued when an individual fails to appear for a court hearing).

Fortunately, the other aspects of my work more than compensated any disappointments that I may have had with the Program. My work on behalf of individual clients was fulfilling and largely successful, and my broader legislative and regulatory advocacy efforts were both challenging and exciting. In May, I prepared and submitted public comments in response to a Department of Justice interim rule that modified the process for conducting background and security investigations during immigration court proceedings. My comments acknowledged the important purposes of the interim rule, and made recommendations that would help the Department of Justice meet those ends more effectively, without creating an undue burden for respondents in immigration court. I completed my Liman fellowship at the end of October.

Although I am leaving the Washington Lawyers’ Committee, I will not be leaving Washington, D.C.  I have accepted a two-year litigation fellowship with the ACLU National Prison Project, and I am extremely excited about the opportunity to gain major litigation experience.