This seminar addresses the humanitarian endeavor to provide legal relief and protection to victims of persecution and torture. The seminar is both substance- and skill-based and will be co-taught by two attorneys with extensive asylum litigation experience: one of the directors of the law school’s Immigration Clinic and a recently-retired U.S. Department of Justice Senior Litigation Counsel. Students will grapple with the following fundamental questions:

What are the international bases of U.S. humanitarian protection law?

What are the contours of the protection the U.S. provides?

How does procedural access affect the scope of protection?

What is the need, if any, for cross-border relief and protection?

Is current U.S. law adequate to meet the need for protection or the country’s protection obligations?

Rather than producing a final paper, seminar students will demonstrate mastery of asylum law issues by writing and refining an appellate brief and by presenting oral argument in a mock federal court case before a panel of practicing attorneys. Additionally, each student will serve as the class expert as to a particular aspect of asylum law. This course will complement the already-offered immigration law survey course, the already-offered administrative law course, and the work of the Chacón Center clinics.