EL SEGUNDO, Calif. – In the run up to the 2016 election, Donald Trump made big promises when it came to immigration reform and has worked to make moves to put those promises into motion.

According to the American Community Survey, California has the highest number of foreign-born residents. Lindsay Toczylowski is the Executive Director for the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, one of the largest nonprofit providers of deportation defense in California, who says it has been a crazy ride the last couple of years.

“What we’ve seen is an administration that is – their main focus is looking at ways that they can deny people due process, that they can deny people access to counsel, and really, that they can shut down the entire asylum system as we’ve had in the United States for decades and since the beginning of this country,” Toczylowski said. “So, because of that, it’s been really challenging to be an immigration lawyer at this time.”

Recently, the Trump Administration was blocked from implementing a regulation that would allow the government to hold migrants in detention centers indefinitely.

“These facilities are not appropriate for children, they’re essentially jails that we’re keeping children in,” Toczylowski said.

The Flores agreement says these children must be released within 20 days. Toczylowski said more unaccompanied children who came to the border were reunited with friends, family members, and parents who live here in Los Angeles than any other place in the United States during 2017 to 2018.  

“So when we see those horrific pictures at the border camps, when we see children who are being denied access to the asylum system at all, what we know is that those are kids who are, really, L.A.’s kids. They are children who were destined for Southern California, who once they are out of custody will go to our schools, they will be integrated into our communities,” she said. “It’s something that’s happening to our families and our communities here.”

The Immigrant Defenders Law Center is working in local shelters with children who have arrived to the United States without a parent or guardian or have been separated from their parents.

“We accompany these children to court, because everyone would go to court alone if they don’t have a pro bono attorney or can’t afford an attorney,” Toczylowski said.

Their youngest client is 3-months-old.

“They are expected to defend themselves against deportation,” she said.

They provide free lawyers and make sure no child in Los Angeles is going into court alone. They provide all children up to 17-years-old a “know your rights” presentation to help understand the legal process.

“What we’ve seen over and over with the Trump administration is really a dismantling of people being able to access the system at all. So that can be done in many ways, a lot of times it’s by creating procedures that make it so people don’t even get to see a judge but it can also be by denying them access to counsel,” she said. “We know you are 1,100 percent more likely to win your case if you have a lawyer by your side.”

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