"IJC is helping us bring justice"
Immigrant Justice Corps (IJC) is proud to partner with legal services and community-based organizations on the frontlines of the fight to expand access to immigrant justice. We are blessed to be joined by host organizations striving to meet the needs of immigrant communities in less resourced geographies. This year, every organization fighting for immigrant justice needed all the capacity they could get to keep immigrant families together.
We asked our partners to share the impact IJC Fellows had on their organizations and immigrant communities. Here is what they had to say:
“The Advocates has had an incredible experience with our IJC Fellows. They bring an energy, zeal, and excellence that expands our work and empowers our team. They have been willing to dive right in and bring their entire selves to this work. As Minnesota welcomes an increasing number of new Americans to our community, we are grateful to partner with IJC to ensure we can bring quality information and legal services to as many asylum seekers, children, and trafficking survivors as possible.”
– Hanne Sandison (IJC Justice Fellow ’17), Refugee & Immigrant Program Director, The Advocates for Human Rights
“Building One Community is extremely honored to partner with IJC and begin our third year hosting Justice Fellows to provide critically needed removal defense legal services and representation to underserved newly arrived immigrants to Stamford and greater Fairfield County. This partnership is a critical and vital lifeline to Connecticut’s asylum seekers because there are not nearly enough nonprofit legal services and resources in the state to meet the high demand.”
– Anka Badurina, PhD, Executive Director, Building One Community
“Our Fellows Jessica and Teresa have been the driving force behind the remarkable success of our organization and our impactful legal work. Their unwavering dedication and exceptional legal expertise have expanded our capabilities and elevated the quality of our services. Their commitment to our core principle of expanding due process, in which everyone has a fair, dignified, and meaningful opportunity to be heard, goes far beyond the call of duty.”
– Allyson “Al” Page, Executive Director, Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy (ISLA)
“Over the years, Lutheran Social Services of New York (LSSNY) has been grateful for the contributions of IJC Justice Fellows because they have increased our capacity to provide direct legal representation, information, and legal clinics to people in New York City and the surrounding region. Over the past year, our IJC fellows were crucial to LSSNY’s ability to provide rapid legal assistance to recently arrived immigrants to New York City. Justice Fellows have increased equity and access to immigration justice by handling a diversity of cases including assisting people from under-represented African diaspora populations.”
– Victor Yee-Ling Cheng, (IJC Justice Fellow ’18), Supervising Attorney, Lutheran Social Services of New York (LSSNY)
“Our Immigrant Justice Corps Fellows have done amazing work advocating for immigrants in the Midwest – from winning protection under the Convention Against Torture for people fleeing danger to seeking bond to let people fight their immigration cases free from detention and reunited with their families. With IJC, we were able to expand our work defending immigrants in detention from three attorneys to five. Now, IJC is bringing new advocates to our team that represents children in immigration cases. It is unthinkable that vulnerable people like children or those held in detention are not guaranteed a right to a lawyer, but IJC is helping us bring justice to more and more members of our community.”
– Elizabeth Gibson (IJC Justice Fellow ’16), Managing Attorney for Capacity Building and Mentorship, National Immigrant Justice Center
“NDS is fortunate to be hosting Karla Hernandez as a Justice Fellow for a third year, allowing her to build upon the complex docket of removal cases she built during the first two years of her fellowship. IJC Fellows always bring an exceptionally high skill level to our immigration practice, and Karla is no exception. With IJC, we can expand the reach of our high-quality services and fight for clients at the intersection of the criminal and immigration systems, who often face both the most complex cases and the most unjust punishment – banishment from their homes and families.”
– Emily Ponder Williams, Managing Attorney, Civil Defense Practice; Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem
We are so proud of the work we’ve done with our partners in immigrant communities. With over 130 active Fellows embedded in host organizations in more than 20 states, we’re adding capacity so that they can help tens of thousands of immigrant families and unaccompanied children. Thank you to all our Fellows and host organization partners for making this critical work possible!
