Overview

Public Counsel uses litigation to protect and enhance the rights of immigrants throughout the United States. Our lawsuits have focused on requiring the U.S. government to provide all immigrants with due process. We have achieved the following:

• Forced the U.S. government to provide trauma-informed mental health services to families separated at the border under the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy.
• Forced the U.S. government to provide due process to immigrants with severe mental disabilities. As a result of our litigation, the government now must screen for and identify immigrants in detention with severe mental disabilities and appoint counsel at government expense for those found incompetent.
• Stopped the Trump administration from implementing unlawful policies which would have prevented thousands of unaccompanied children from obtaining Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and from accessing child-friendly asylum procedures.
• Forced the Trump administration to return to the United States vulnerable children who were unlawfully deported back to their home countries in violation of a court order.
• Forced the Trump administration to allow back into the United States and grant citizenship to a veteran of the U.S. Armed Forces who had been deported.
• Forced the Trump administration to release from custody immigrants at high risk of COVID.