Resources
Publication Date
04/18/2024
This resource - created in partnership with the End SIJS Backlog Coalition, CILA, and NIPNLG - addresses common questions and myths about the visa bulletin, how to talk to clients about the SIJS backlog, and how both advocates and directly impacted young people can get involved in the Coalition’s work to end the backlog and its harms.
Resources
Publication Date
04/26/2024
This updated guidance, written with our partners Immigrant Legal Defense (ILD), International Rescue Committee (IRC), and Legal Services for Children (LSC), includes recommendations for what information to include in state court predicate orders for special immigrant juvenile status (SIJS) in California. It incorporates guidance from the 2022 SIJS regulations as well as the USCIS Policy Manual, and includes helpful citations to California law. It also includes sample predicate orders from family, probate, dependency, and delinquency courts.
Resources
Publication Date
05/08/2024
On April 1, 2024, the United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) released a new version of Form N-400, Application for Naturalization. All applicants for naturalization must use this new form. To help attorneys, USDOJ accredited representatives, and others learn how to complete this new version of the form, we have developed a new step-by-step guide. It provides instructions on how to complete the Form N-400 and includes tips on how to best approach common issues related to eligibility and possible red flags, as well as practical considerations for submission.
Resources
Publication Date
05/15/2024
Everyone, regardless of immigration status, has a constitutionally guaranteed right to free speech and lawful assembly. Noncitizens, however, are uniquely placed at a disadvantage when exercising those rights if law enforcement intervene and make arrests. Read and share our one-pager in English and Spanish to learn about the top 10 things noncitizen protestors should know before they take to the streets to exercise their rights.
Resources
Publication Date
05/15/2024
This Community Alert is a reminder for recipients of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) from El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, and Sudan that re-registration deadlines are coming soon. Review to learn about the deadlines for each country.
Resources
Publication Date
05/15/2024
Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS) provides a pathway to a green card for young people who have been “abandoned, abused, or neglected” by a parent. This Community Explainer unpacks what that means, what the SIJS key benefits are, and how one may become eligible to apply for this path to relief.
Resources
Publication Date
05/20/2024
Resources
Publication Date
05/22/2024
Thousands of noncitizens in California are at risk of removal because they have criminal convictions that were unlawfully imposed. California law provides several ways to eliminate these convictions with post-conviction relief (PCR). The challenge is that there are not enough PCR experts to meet the need, especially for low-income immigrants.
Resources
Publication Date
06/21/2024
On June 12, the ILRC submitted a comment opposing the Biden administration’s proposed rule that seeks to apply certain mandatory bars to asylum at the fear screening stage. The proposed rule contradicts the administration’s previous finding that such a policy would be inconsistent with statutory intent. It would also deprive asylum seekers of an opportunity to access asylum procedures by adding legally complex bars to the threshold screening for eligibility.
Resources
Publication Date
06/26/2024
If you are undocumented and have been a victim of a crime, served as a witness for law enforcement, or have been subject to human trafficking, you may be eligible to apply for certain forms of immigration status. These are known as U, T, and S visas. In most cases, the application process for these visas will require help from a law enforcement agency. This Community Explainer details how a new California law, AB 1261, aims to better protect immigrants who are applying for these forms of relief and ensure that California law enforcement agencies help them when needed.
Resources
Publication Date
06/26/2024
On August 30, 2022, the Biden Administration issued a new rule on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) that incorporates DACA into the Federal Regulations, a process that serves to codify the program into law. Since its announcement, there have been several questions around who can access DACA now and what it means for all those first-time applicants who are waiting to obtain DACA. This Community Explainer details how the rule impacts current DACA recipients, how ongoing court battles affect how DACA is implemented, and more.
Resources
Publication Date
05/01/2012
Highlighting Changes Implemented by the Trafficking Victims Protection and Reauthorization Act (03/2009): These are materials from our March 2009 webinar which highlighted important new changes implemented by the Trafficking Victims Protection and Reauthorization Act of 2008 (signed into law on December 23, 2008) to the eligibility requirements for filing a Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS) petition. Expert practitioners provided strategies to overcome challenges posed in obtaining SIJS, including obtaining juvenile court orders from dependency, delinquency, and probate courts and obtaining specific consent to apply for SIJS while a child is in federal custody. If you are interested in participating in this webinar if held in the future please email seminars@ilrc.org.
Resources
Publication Date
12/06/2010
Written by Doug DiSalvo East Bay Citizenship Network May 1999
Resources
Publication Date
11/19/2010
Immigration Benchbook for Juvenile and Family Courts, Updated July 2010 (PDF, 2010) This is a national benchbook for juvenile and family court judges on various immigration related issues including: Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, adoption, VAWA, U Visas, divorce, child custody, immigration consequences of delinquency and crime, and immigration enforcement.
Resources
Publication Date
04/19/2024
These three charts, updated in 2024, outline the different requirements for acquiring and deriving citizenship. Because the law governing acquisition and derivation has changed many times and is generally not retroactive, these charts detail what the eligibility requirements are depending on the time period in question. Each chart has extensive footnotes that provide explanations about the legal requirements, possible arguments where there is any ambiguity, and cites to further resources.
Resources
Publication Date
05/02/2012
On September 6, 2011, USCIS issued a policy memorandum on adjudications of VAWA self-petitions for applicants who are over 21 but under 25 years of age.
Resources
Publication Date
11/19/2010
This model code was written as a collaboration between our staff and accredited representatives around the country. It was inspired, in part, by the complaint heard occasionally (mostly from attorneys) that, while attorneys have a code of ethics to which they are bound, accredited representatives have no such code.
Resources
Publication Date
11/19/2010
A description of critical resources available for California criminal defenders defending noncitizens:
Resources
Publication Date
10/04/2012
Updated October 2012! A guide to assist public defenders and other to determine the immigration consequences of selected Arizona offenses.
Resources
Publication Date
11/19/2010
Practice advisory by Katherine Brady on the Supreme Court case Nijhawan v. Holder, which deals with the categorical approach and aggravated felonies.
Resources
Publication Date
11/30/2010
To read the monograph detailing the ILRC's work on social change lawyering, please download the following file:
Resources
Publication Date
12/06/2010
by ILRC Staff Attorneys, 1996
Resources
Publication Date
12/06/2010
This report is an introductory narrative of how Proyecto Campesino and O.L.A. Raza conduct community organizing, rural leadership development, and civic participation campaigns using radio programs, naturalization assistance, citizenship classes, and civic action leagues comprised of immigrant membership. Farmworker organizations can duplicate and adapt some of the information and organizing techniques in their own communities that these two dynamic organizations have been using for years.
Resources
Publication Date
02/28/2011
Matter of Alyazji, 25 I&N Dec. 397 (BIA 2011), overruling in part Matter of Shanu, 23 I&N Dec. 754 (BIA 2005).
Resources
Publication Date
03/17/2011
"Many Permanent Residents Are Not Subject to the § 212(h) Permanent Resident Bar; The Eleventh Circuit Reaffirms § 212(h) as a Direct Waiver of Deportability; Using § 212(h) When LPR Cancellation is Not an Option" by Kathy Brady
Resources
Publication Date
03/22/2011