Digital Commons @ UDC Law (University of the District of Columbia Law Library)
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Critical Interviewing
No full textCritical lawyering—also at times called rebellious, community, and movement lawyering—attempts to further social justice alongside impacted communities. While much has been written about the contours of this form of lawyering and case examples illustrating core principles, little has been written about the mechanics of teaching critical lawyering skills. This Article seeks to expand critical lawyering theory, and in doing so, provide an example of a pedagogical approach to teaching what we term “critical interviewing.” Critical interviewing means using an intersectional lens to collaborate with clients, communities, interviewing partners, and interpreters in a legal interview. Critical interviewers identify and take into account historical and structural biases, privileges, and the role they play in the attorney-client relationship. This Article urges law professors and legal professionals to operationalize critical legal theories into practice, and ultimately to develop experiential pedagogies to teach these critical lawyering skills. This call to developing new pedagogies is particularly urgent in the wake of nationwide uprisings in response to the killing of George Floyd and others, as well as corresponding law schools’ commitments to identify and dismantle institutional racism. In this Article, we first set forth the contours of the canonical client interviewing pedagogy. Second, we outline the tenets of critical lawyering—a lawyering practice animated by critical legal theories. Next, we advance the pedagogy of critical interviewing, building upon client-centered lawyering texts. We describe one methodology of teaching critical interviewing: the Legal Interviewing and Language Access films. Ideally positioned to use with virtual, hybrid, or in person learning, these videos raise a multitude of issues, including addressing bias and collaborating with clinic partners, interpreters, and clients. Finally, the Article considers areas ripe for further exploration within critical interviewing, concluding with a call for engagement with new pedagogical tools to teach critical interviewing, along with other aspects of critical lawyering
Asylum Under Attack: Restoring Asylum Protections in the United States
No full textThe U.S. asylum system has endured four years of systematic attack. The Trump Administration attempted to dismantle the United States’ system to protect asylum seekers through changes to case law, executive orders, presidential proclamations, internal agency guidance and sweeping regulatory changes, among other measures. The system largely ground to a halt after the Trump Administration co-opted the coronavirus public health crisis to effectively close the southern border to asylum seekers with its March 2020 Centers for Disease Control order. This catastrophic order was not even the last in a long line of the Trump Administration’s efforts since assuming power to obliterate asylum protection. Building on the actions from 2017 forward, even in its waning days, the Trump Administration proposed and finalized numerous sets of regulations to undermine and eviscerate asylum protection.A combination of public outcry and litigation halted or limited some of the Trump Administration’s attempts to under-mine asylum protection. Other policies went into effect and some remain in effect under the Biden Administration, with dramatic results. By tracing the sustained series of policies, regulations, and other actions taken by the Trump Administration against asylum seekers, this article not only bears witness to the attacks on the asylum system, but also offers a roadmap of policies to be undone by the Biden-Harris Administration. Taking into account the public commitments made by President Biden during his campaign and post-election on asylum issues, this article outlines the immediate and long-term actions that the Biden-Harris Administration must take. Initial actions by President Biden, including an Executive Order addressing asylum issues and the U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021 introduced in Congress are promising, but the “COVID ban” on asylum seekers under Title 42 of the Public Health Act remains in effect. This article sets forth what is necessary to not only right the wrongs committed by the Trump Administration, but to provide meaningful asylum protection and to reassume the United States’ role as the global leader in refugee protection
Removing Police from Schools Using State Law Heightened Scrutiny
No full textThis Article argues that school police, often called school resource officers, interfere with the state law right to education and proposes using the constitutional right to education under state law as a mechanism to remove police from schools. Disparities in school discipline for Black and brown children are well-known. After discussing the legal structures of school policing, this Article uses the Disability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit) theoretical framework developed by Subini Annamma, David Connor, and Beth Ferri to explain why police are unacceptable in schools. Operating under the premise that school police are unacceptable, this Article then analyzes mechanisms to effect the abolition of police in schools, focusing on solutions to school policing that are consistent with DisCrit principles. This Article proposes using the state law constitutional right to education as that mechanism. Every state, in its constitution, provides for some form of a right to education. While an imperfect solution, this Article considers the state constitutional right to education as an approach to remove police from schools with broader ramifications for dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline