Thank you for joining us this semester, we will see you in the Spring. Best of luck with finals and Happy Holiday season. |
|
The Migrant Busing Crisis: From the Border to Martha's Vineyard
Recap by Yoxira Espinoza
On November 10, 2022, the Aoki Center co-sponsored a virtual event with the Immigration Law Association at King Hall and the Hispanic Institution Initiative. Iván Espinoza-Madrigal, the Executive Director of the Lawyers for Civil Rights (LCR), led the important discussion on his organization's pending Martha's Vineyard class action lawsuit against Governor DeSantis and other co-conspirators.
Earlier this year, LCR and Iván responded to the humanitarian crisis at the island and found about 50 vulnerable Venezuelan migrants. They discovered that the migrants were targeted for their nationality and fraudulently induced to get on a plane. They found that many of the migrants had humanitarian parole and pending immigration hearings.
With this newfound information, the LCR helped the migrants get medical attention, coordinate pro bono assistance and mobilize community support. They then
proceeded to file a class action in Boston on behalf of the affected migrants. They raised about a dozen of claims, most notably a Preemption Claim for interference with federal immigration matters, a Discrimination & Equal Protection Claim on the basis of the migrants shared nationality and identity, and a Conspiracy to violate civil rights claim. The LCR filed this lawsuit because the migrants need to be made whole and because they want to prevent anyone else from being preyed upon for political gain.
Iván emphasized the importance social justice and immigrant rights work but also mentioned that he has been receiving a number of death threats since filing this litigation. Despite numerous threats to his safety, he encouraged us to step up when there is an injustice. His passion and advocacy was contagious and hearing him speak served as a reminder as to why I pursued a career in law. We need to use the law as an instrument of justice and to rise up to the occassion when someone is in need.
|
|
Tingley v. Ferguson - The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court, and upheld Washington's anti-conversion therapy law protecting minors.
The Aoki Center for Critical Race and Nation Studies has joined as amicus in Tingley v. Ferguson along with the Fred T. Korematsu Center for Law and Equality and many others. On September 6, 2022, the Court held that the plaintiff had standing individually (but not third-party standing on behalf of his patients) but then affirmed the rejection of his constitutional challenge on the merits. Further, the Court concluded that the central holding in Pickup was not overruled or abrogated by the Supreme Court NIFLA opinion, that the law passed rational basis review over the First and Fourteenth amendment challenge, that the law was neutral and not directed at religious exercise, and that the law was not unconstitutionally vague. Please see attached opinion: Tingley v. Ferguson.
|
|
|| King Hall News & Events || |
|
Building a Culture of Ethical Inclusion |
|
Wednesday, Nov. 30
12:10 - 1:00 p.m.
King Hall, Room 1301
|
|
Corporate firms have long expressed their support of the notion that their organizations should become more demographically diverse, while creating a culture that is inclusive of all members of the firm. These firms have traditionally, however, not been successful at improving demographic diversity and true inclusion within the upper echelons of their organizations. The reality that firms’ statements failed to live up to their realities, however, was upended after the #MeToo Movement of 2017 and 2018, which was followed by corporate support of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement in 2020. These two social movements, while distinct in many ways, forced firms to rethink how to approach the status of women and people of color within their organizations. It forced them to ask, yet again, but with renewed energy: “What is the best way to improve diversity and inclusion within firms?” I argue that in addition to pursuing the Business and Legal Cases for diversity when crafting diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”) programs, firms should also employ the “Ethics Case,” which is necessary for creating a truly inclusive organizational culture.
Veronica Root Martinez joined the Duke Law faculty in 2022 from Notre Dame Law School, where she was a professor of law, the Robert & Marion Short Scholar, and director of the Program on Ethics, Compliance & Inclusion.
Martinez teaches Securities Litigation, Enforcement, & Compliance; Corporate Compliance & Ethics; Global Compliance Survey; Professional Responsibility; and Contracts. Her greatest professional joy is when her Contracts students begin to analyze cases like lawyers.
King Hall's Racial Justice Speaker Series
Created in response to the tragic killings by police of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others and the widespread protests that followed, UC Davis Law’s Racial Justice Speaker Series is now in its third year. Reaffirming the law school’s longtime commitment to racial justice, the series invites leading scholars from around the country to explore systemic racism as it pertains to all communities of color and areas of law. The goals are to inform, enlighten, and - most important - engage in meaningful conversation with our King Hall community and the larger public.
** California MCLE credits will be available for all attendees. MCLE certificates will be emailed within a week of the event.
COVID - 19 Guidelines:
|
|
|| King Hall Professor Spotlight || |
|
Professor Mary Ziegler is an expert on the law, history, and politics of reproduction, health care, and conservatism in the United States from 1945 to the present. She is one of the world’s leading historians of the U.S. abortion debate.
Professor Ziegler has two forthcoming books. One, which will come out on what would have been the fiftieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade with Yale University Press, asks why Roe has remained so resonant, even when scholars have criticized it and the law has moved beyond it. She is also editing a comparative volume on the international law of abortion with Elgar Press that includes scholars from every continent. Then, a piece in the Harvard Law Review Forum responding to Dov Fox's article on medical disobedience. Long term, she has a book under contract with Yale that studies the history of the movement for fetal personhood and asks how other movements for social justice can take back the question of personhood for other marginalized communities.
|
|
|| UC Davis News & Events || |
|
|
|
Hispanic Outlook Magazine last month named UC Davis as one of the “Top 100 Colleges and Universities for Hispanics,” and the people leading UC Davis’ effort to become a Hispanic-Serving Institution, or HSI, say that’s just a peek at things to come. “It’s been our past, our present and our future,” said Lina Mendez, director of HSI Initiatives.
|
|
|| News, Events & Upcoming Symposia || |
|
On Thursday September 29, 2022 Governor Newsom signed into law the Racial Justice Act for All, AB 256. The legislation allows individuals to challenge racial bias in criminal charges, convictions, and sentences. Prior to AB 256, the 30-year legal precedent by McCleskey v. Kemp made it almost impossible to prove racial basis. Now, Californians with past judgments, convictions, sentences prior to January 1, 2021 can petition for retroactive relief to help rectify the harmful results of racism in the criminal legal system. This is a huge victory for our state and hopefully only the beginning towards systemic change.
|
|
Proposition 308 was passed in Arizona, this will allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates at public universities and colleges.
|
|
The End of Title 42
Last Tuesday, federal judge, Emmet Sullivan, ordered the Biden Administration to end Title 42. Title 42 was implemented by the Trump Administration as a border management tool to help prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Under the policy, the US denied migrants' rights to seek asylum under US and International Law. This decision is a huge victory and hopefully means the US will now provide refuge to those fleeing persecution.
|
|
|| Highlights, Podcasts & More || |
|
Immigration Law Clinic Co-director and Professor Holly Cooper discusses her work to improve conditions for unaccompanied immigrant children in government custody. Professor Cooper walks us through the recent preliminary injunction in the national class action lawsuit Lucas R. v. Becerra that ensures more procedural protections for migrant children.
|
|
UC Davis Law's podcast about faculty scholarship, Justice Defined: Scholars of King Hall, focuses on research areas including immigration, business, civil rights, environmental and constitutional law and more. |
|
The UC Davis Immigration Law Clinic (ILC), co-directed by Professors Amagda Perez and Holly Cooper, continues to do exceptional work for the Northern California immigrant communities. Most recently, a number of clinic students organized a workshop for unaccompanied minors. During a span of approximately eight hours, the clinic students and volunteers, with the supervision of Holly Cooper and Aidin Castillo (Director of UC Immigrant Legal Services), serviced and screened the unaccompanied minors for Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, Asylum claims, and other potential forms of relief. The ILC truly offers a unique opportunity and experience to its students, it enhances the law school experience and helps to foster powerful immigrant advocates. |
|
UC Davis Law Professor Mary Ziegler provides perspective on the historic reversal of Roe v. Wade by discussing how we got here, what happened and what the future will look like. Professor Ziegler says that the Supreme Court's ruling was in effect an attempt to change American democracy and will have an impact far beyond reproductive rights. Looking forward, she says we could see two Americas emerge when it comes to abortion.
|
|
Moving Beyond Performative Land Acknowledgments
“The U.S. has the most diverse education with about 3000 higher education institutions. With that number, there are very few institutions that practice studying and understanding the origins of land through acknowledgement ….if they are, it's only among the faculty and students who happen to be indigenous. Institutions need to take action and acknowledge the origins and communities that are alive and well.”
The Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Leadership, Equity, and Justice is proud to present another episode of the “Varying Viewpoints” podcast. Our podcast series highlights recent and relevant work of scholars and leaders, and provides an engaging way to share innovative scholarship that focuses on diversifying leadership, enhancing equity, and fostering justice in higher education.
In this episode of the Varying Viewpoints podcast series, Alicia Nani Reyes, a 2022 John Smartt Summer Scholar, spoke with Theresa Stewart Ambo, an assistant professor of educational studies at the University of California, San Diego. The majority of higher education institutions in the United States are settled on stolen Indigenous Land, which has led to those colleges and universities reckoning with their past in the form of land acknowledgments. These settler land acknowledgments address the historical dispossession of Indigenous Peoples, but often forget to recognize that these very communities are still here. Theresa speaks on her experience in engaging in research around critiquing the usage of land acknowledgments and gives her perspectives as an Indigenous person. Theresa also discusses how institutions can refrain from their statements being performative and take direct action, which will advance justice for Indigenous peoples, communities, and students.
Listen to this episode here to learn more about Theresa’s research, land acknowledgements at settler institutions, and how to move beyond performative action for Indigenous communities.
|
|
Follow the Aoki Center online!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
