The Legal Aid Society is the nation's oldest and largest not-for-profit public interest law firm for low-income families and individuals. Since the 1980s, LAS has maintained a citywide Immigration Law Unit (ILU) within the Civil Practice. ILU, now comprised of over 90 staff, is a recognized leader in the delivery of free, comprehensive, and high-caliber immigration legal services to low-income immigrants in New York City and surrounding counties. Staff represent immigrants before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), before immigration judges in removal proceedings, on appeals to the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), and in federal court on habeas corpus petitions and petitions for review. Over the most recent year, ILU assisted in over 8,500 individual legal matters benefiting over 21,100 New Yorkers citywide.
• The Non-detained Removal Defense Project represents non-citizens before the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in Immigration Court proceedings, and on appeals to the Board of Immigration Appeals.
• The New York Immigrant Family Unity Project (NYIFUP), a collaboration between Legal Aid, Brooklyn Defender Services, and The Bronx Defenders, represents individuals in federal immigration detention who are at imminent risk of being deported and have been separated from their families here in New York.
• The Immigrant Youth Project represents unaccompanied children and youth in New York to obtain Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS), asylum, T and U visas, and other immigration benefits.
• The Domestic Violence Immigration Project represents survivors of domestic violence, human trafficking, and other forms of gender-based violence and their families to obtain legal status through Violence Against Women Act self-petitions, battered spouse waivers, U and T visas, asylum, and other immigration benefits.
• ILU’s Affirmative Benefits Team represents immigrants before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) with a wide variety of applications, such as citizenship, green cards, family-based petitions, consular processing, Temporary Protected Status (TPS), and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).
• ILU’s Federal Litigation Team files habeas corpus cases challenging our clients’ arbitrary and often prolonged incarceration by ICE, and, in collaboration with partners, brings class action and other impact litigation to enjoin some of the government’s most pernicious and destructive policies.
• Immigration Legal Clinic Team provides limited scope application assistance on a wide variety of matters, including helping with work permits and KYR presentations for those who are in Immigration Court proceedings.
In addition to direct legal services, we conduct outreach presentations with community members and grass-roots organizations and provide critical immigration legal information to New Yorkers through our Know Your Rights hub on our website and our dedicated legal helpline telephone bank. We also provide regular trainings to immigrant-serving advocates from community-based organizations, state and local agencies, and judicial and legislative staff. Partnerships with other non-profit organizations and coordination of a successful pro bono program with nearly 70 participating law firms enable the ILU to maximize resources to meet the increasing demand for representation.Immigration specialists in Legal Aid's Criminal Defense Practice and Juvenile Rights Practice also support staff in serving non-citizen clients in those practice areas.
