Pro Bono Services
ABIL lawyers are widely respected for their pro bono immigration work and have consistently extended justice to the vulnerable.
In addition to our focus on corporate and business immigration, ABIL lawyers and their firms are at the forefront in advancing pro bono representation in the immigration field and have a passion for expanding justice for those most at risk. ABIL firms actively work to instill the importance of pro bono representation among its lawyers.
ABIL lawyers have successfully represented clients in asylum matters as well as defended them in other complex removal hearings. They have represented clients in cutting edge business immigration issues on a pro bono basis, including winning an important ruling in the Ninth Circuit on limiting the evidentiary standards for qualifying as a person of extraordinary ability in Kazarian v. USCIS, 596 F.3d 1115 (9th Cir. 2010). In 2020, ABIL firms co-counseled to challenge a Department of Labor wage rule, Purdue v. Scalia, and to protect winners of the Diversity Lottery from an allegedly COVID-related immigrant visa ban, Aker v. Trump.
One ABIL member is the Chair of the Pro Bono Committee of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and past chair of the AILA-NY Chapter’s pro bono committee, who has also housed two pro bono fellows on behalf of the AILA-NY chapter in his firm. Other ABIL members work closely with AILAs Military Assistance Program (MAP), the Legal Action Center of the American Immigration Council, Stop the Traffik, Advocates for Human Rights, Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, KIDS in Need of Defense, the New York City Bar Justice Center, Volunteers for Legal Services (VOLS), various arts organizations, women’s rights organizations, and many individual asylum seekers and survivors of domestic violence.
Finally, ABIL members have received high honors and recognition for their pro bono contributions, including two ABIL firms that in 2010 received the national Beacon of Justice award from the National Legal Aid & Defender Association, the oldest and largest U.S. non-profit association of individual legal professionals and legal organizations devoted to ensuring the delivery of legal services to the poor.