BuzzFeed News interviews Professor Cooper about attorney-vetting form

BuzzFeed News interviewed Professor Holly Cooper about a form vetting attorneys for immigrant children that Cooper received from federal immigration officials but that since has been discontinued.

Cooper, co-director of the Immigration Law Clinic, first brought the form to public attention by tweeting on Oct. 15 about having received it, and including a photo of the form.

The form from the Office of Refugee Resettlement asked attorneys for immigrant children to agree to background checks of their credit history, insurance, and information about “personal characteristics” and “mode of living.”

On Oct. 20, an official with Health and Human Services told BuzzFeed News that the agency is “stopping all use of the form and background checks for all attorneys,” and now requires only that attorneys be in good standing with a state bar association.

“Obviously, with this administration, we (were) worried about what they view as a proper 'mode of living’ — we don’t know what that encompasses,” Cooper told BuzzFeed News. “I think it’s not a proper way to go about determining if a lawyer should have access to detained children.”

Professor Holly S. Cooper ’98 has extensive litigation experience defending the rights of immigrants and is a nationally recognized expert on immigration detention issues and on the immigration consequences of criminal convictions.