We have all heard the questions and comments: Why don’t “they” just come legally? Why don’t “they” get in line and wait their turn? My grandparents came legally and it was easy. Why is there such a shortage of high tech workers in the U.S.? If the kids are US citizens, why can’t the parents stay here? If she is a veteran of the U.S. military how can she be deported? If she marries a U.S. citizen, doesn’t she just become a citizen? How and why was there a rush to evacuate so many Afghans in August 2021? And how about all those foreign hockey and baseball and soccer players: how did they get to the U.S.?

U.S. immigration law has often been compared with tax law in its complexity. It has developed over the last 200 years with a hodge-podge of statutes, regulations, executive orders and court cases. When an immigration case hits the media, it is rarely explained within the context of the larger picture. The purpose of this OLL 2-part course will be to teach the basic structure of the US immigration system: who is a citizen? What is a “green card”? How does a person come to the U.S. legally, and what happens if he/she comes illegally? We will examine how a foreign relative can come to the U.S., and how an employer can bring in a foreign worker. We will look at how someone can come as a refugee or apply for asylum. We will examine what works and what doesn’t in this complex system and we will talk about some of the large and small changes that could bring more humanity and logic to all of these processes.

Presenter:

Nancy Elkind is a retired lawyer who limited her practice to immigration law for more than 35 years. She has a master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Wisconsin, and earned her J.D. from the University of Denver College of Law. She was admitted to practice in Colorado, and before the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court. Nancy’s practice covered all aspects of immigration law including family-based cases, asylum, removal, consular processing and employment-based cases. She always enjoyed (and was often frustrated by) the complexity of immigration law and the challenges involved in solving the unique issues of each client’s case. Whether she was working with a Somali asylum-seeker or an Australian corporate executive, Nancy was always aware that the work she did could make a difference in their lives. Nancy also enjoys teaching others about immigration law and over the years has written many articles and spoken many times at immigration law conferences and to lay groups. She was cited in the publication The Best Lawyers in America for more than 20 years, and was named one of the “Top 25 Women Lawyers in Colorado” in 2007 and 2008. She was named “Lawyer of the Year” in Immigration Law in the Denver area by Best Lawyers in 2012, and in 2016 she received the “Outstanding Sustained Contribution Award” by the Colorado Lawyers Committee. She was also given a Lifetime Achievement award by the Colorado Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Nancy made her first visit to Oaxaca in 2001, and has returned almost every year since.