UI clinic helps immigrants with legal issues

MOSCOW – A free legal aid clinic at the University of Idaho Law School is helping those who face deportation or other immigration proceedings, but not without criticism.

The immigration component was added to the law school’s long-standing Tribal Clinic in 2000, said UI professor Monica Schurtman, the clinic’s supervising attorney. She founded the clinic when she foresaw immigration as a growing issue in Idaho.

“In 2000, it was obvious to me that there was a huge jump in the immigrant population coming,” Schurtman said of her reasons for creating the clinic. “It’s something I’ve always been passionate about.”

Schurtman herself is the daughter of immigrants, European Jews who were displaced by Nazi occupation. She said their experience gives her a personal stake in cases where a person may have legal standing but doesn’t have the resources or knowledge to prove it.

“One, I help people because it’s just part of who I am, and my personal history,” she said. “Two, it’s my grounding in human rights law.”

But Robert Vasquez, the former Canyon County commissioner and congressional candidate well known for his ardent stance against illegal immigration, said the operation of the clinic is nothing short of a crime.

“Federal law states that anyone who aids and abets an illegal alien in remaining in the Unites States is committing a felony,” Vasquez said by phone from Caldwell.

And while Vasquez recently aborted a Senate campaign due to a lack of money, he could end up in a position to influence immigration policy if his next quest is successful. On Wednesday he confirmed that he is considering another primary run at Republican Rep. Bill Sali, if he can raise sufficient funds. Sali defeated Vasquez in a six-way Republican primary in 2006 on his way to victory in the general election.

Schurtman laughed out loud when she heard that Vasquez thinks her clinic is illegal.

“That’s really funny,” she said. “What we try to do is assist our clients in a well-established legal system to remain legally in the United States.”

She said the program is needed because immigration law is so complicated that people have little hope of tackling it on their own.

An example could be the clinic’s first case, where a Chinese immigrant was detained by Immigration and Naturalization Service for four years. The man was being sought by the Chinese government for violating his country’s marriage laws by having more than one child.

UI students in the clinic, arguing before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, eventually won the case and the man was granted political asylum. “The immigrations courts and the immigration board of appeals told him he had no right to be here,” she said. “Then, after four years, he had the right to be here.”

Vasquez is clear. “If they are a legal alien, and they have committed a crime, and they have been convicted, then their legal status is revoked and they’re deported,” he said. “If they are an illegal alien, they deserve no representation; they should be apprehended immediately and deported. How difficult is that to understand?”

He added that law schools that offer free aid to those with questionable immigration status are in effect aiding and abetting an act of sedition that subverts the country. “Why are they not teaching how to enforce the law and to deport these people?” he asked.

“People are people are people are people,” Schurtman countered. “Borders are artificial. People are not.”