Jason Corral

Life for undocumented immigrants is full of risks. Any encounter with law-enforcement officials — on the sidewalk, while they are driving, or in their homes in the middle of the night — can lead to arrest and possible deportation. But in all such cases, undocumented immigrants have rights...At a workshop on immigrants’ rights held Monday morning at the Memorial Church, attorneys Jason Corral and Cindy Zapata of the Harvard Immigration & Refugee Clinical Program shared legal advice on how to deal with the more aggressive enforcement of immigration laws under the Trump administration. Corral has provided legal services to at least 60 undocumented students studying at Harvard. “In this new day and age, any evidence you can provide, you can end up in removal proceedings,” said Corral.

President Donald Trump’s recent repeal of Temporary Protected Status has led some student activists and TPS recipients to argue that the University should hire more staff for the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic. The Immigration and Refugee Clinic, staffed by attorneys and students at Harvard Law School, provides legal support for immigrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers. The clinic recently hired a full-time staff attorney, Jason M. Corral, to protect University affiliates impacted by the Trump administration’s revised policies...Sabrineh Ardalan, assistant director of the Law School’s Immigration and Refugee Clinical program, wrote in an email that multiple part-time attorneys are present at TPS renewal clinics, and that her spring clinical students are required to volunteer for the clinics at least once. A focus on the University’s response to the TPS repeals comes amid a broader discussion over the University resources for immigrant affiliates.

The Congressional budget deal that re-opened the federal government last night has left undecided the fate of hundreds of thousands of “dreamers” (undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children)—including several dozen Harvard students...Referring to the dreamers’ uncertain status and the recent, separate revocation of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Salvadorans who have been permitted to live in the United States since a massive earthquake struck that country in 2001, Jason Corral, an attorney for the Harvard Immigration Refugee and Clinical Program, said, “The elimination of DACA and the elimination of TPS on top of that will drastically impact the Harvard community.” Corral was hired last year to provide legal services to undocumented Harvard affiliates.

University President Drew G. Faust sent a letter Thursday to House and Senate leadership asking for “immediate attention” to protections for undocumented youth as legislators debated that issue in an unsuccessful effort to stave off a government shutdown. Lawmakers failed to reach a deal, and the shutdown is now entering its third day...In light of the Ninth Circuit ruling, Harvard informed students Wednesday that it will begin assisting with renewal applications. In an email to students, Jason Corral, the staff attorney for Harvard Law School’s Immigration and Refugee Clinic, said DACA renewal applications have been posted to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services website. The University currently has around 65 undocumented students, administrators estimate...“I worry that immigration hardliners will ask for too much of a compromise that may negatively affect immigration law and policy in the long run,” Corral wrote.

The eyes of Harvard’s undocumented students are turned to Washington as lawmakers wrangle over a deal to protect undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. The Trump administration announced in September it would end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program—an Obama-era program that protected these “dreamers”—and set a March deadline for lawmakers to act before those protections expire. DACA protected approximately 790,000 youth, including many of the College’s 65 undocumented students...Jason Corral, the staff attorney at the Harvard Immigration Refugee and Clinical Program, said he is encouraging undocumented students to set up appointments with the clinic. “We've been telling students to set up consultations with us so that we can assess whether they might be eligible for any potential relief beyond DACA,” Corral said. “We have open office hours where people can just drop in or set up an appointment during the week. We've been doing that over the course of the last year.”

When the Trump administration announced on Sept. 5 that it intended to upend the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), which has banned deportation of many young immigrants, the move seemed to set a general course for what would come next...Opening the discussion on “DACA: What’s Next,” moderator Dan Balz, chief correspondent for the Washington Post and a fall resident fellow at the IOP, summarized recent developments, asking the panel members — Carlos Rojas, an immigrant rights advocate and special projects consultant for Youth on Board; Roberto G. Gonzalez, assistant professor of education, Harvard Graduate School of Education; and Jason Corral, staff attorney, Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical program — for their take on the social media back and forth...The DACA program itself was a compromise, said Corral, just as the BRIDGE Act, legislation now before Congress that would essentially legalize DACA, is a compromise. Calling the administration’s initial decision to suspend DACA “discriminatory, racist, nationalist,” Corral said, “It’s not the people that are broken, it’s the immigration law that is broken.”

A plan to rescind protections for nearly a million undocumented immigrants who grew up in the United States has caused confusion and concern on college campuses, including in Massachusetts...The workload has been pretty frantic in the last couple of weeks," said Jason Corral of the Immigration and Refugee Clinic at Harvard University. Corral was hired by Harvard in response to the President's rhetoric on immigration during the campaign. In recent weeks, they have been preparing for Tuesday's announcement, anticipating that several students would be impacted. "People that are not US citizens are concerned," Corral said, "In addition to this being a slap in the face to DACA students, I think it's symbolic of the tone the administration has taken in general."

...Harvard President Drew Faust has prominently defended the DACA program, and called the order to rescind it "cruel." And after the election of Donald Trump, the university hired a full-time immigration attorney to handle the concerns — and possibly the cases — of students in the country illegally. That attorney, Jason Corral, attended this week's rally, and made a pledge: "What I'd like to do is to talk to every undocumented Harvard student and look to see if there's any underlying legal remedy that goes beyond DACA."

President Donald Trump ended an Obama-era program that protects undocumented youth Tuesday, drawing the swift condemnation of several Harvard administrators...If a student’s DACA status expires—and they are no longer legally permitted to remain in the country—deportation won’t happen immediately, according to Jason Corral, the designated attorney for undocumented students in the law clinic. Students would first have to be placed in formal removal proceedings before facing deportation...Some immigration rights advocates have raised concerns that by handing over personal details to receive DACA status, DACA recipients have unwittingly given the federal government the information it needs to go after them once the program is terminated. “I think it is reasonable to be concerned about that,” Law School professor Gerald L. Neuman said. “I think there are legal arguments about whether that can be done or not, and there may be lawsuits about whether the government can do this if it tries.”

As President Trump last week issued a new executive order preventing citizens from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for 90 days, Harvard continued to ramp up efforts to support international students and scholars in understanding and coping with the policy shift...Resources include a website that provides a centralized source of information for undocumented members of the Harvard community, weekly support groups where students can talk with a counselor, and legal assistance through the Immigration and Refugee Clinic, which recently hired attorney Jason Corral to represent undocumented students and those with legal status obtained through the DACA initiative. “We’ve been advising people since the first set of executive orders came out in January pretty consistently until now,” said Sabrineh Ardalan, the clinic’s assistant director.

Katie M. Derzon,the College’s recently-appointed undocumented student fellow, has partnered with other College administrators to present "a series of concrete recommendations" for supporting undocumented students by the end of the semester. Derzon, a sociology graduate student and tutor in Leverett House, assumed her position earlier this month. She said she meets with undocumented students “one-on-one to work to answer questions as they occur.”...So far, Derzon said she sees connecting students to legal resources as her first priority. She pointed to Jason M. Corral, a staff attorney at the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program, as one of those resources.

Since Donald Trump won the presidential election in November 2016, everything’s been busier at the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program...The clinic has also hired a new staff attorney, Jason Corral, to work full-time to support undocumented students on campus, and hired clinical instructor Cindy Zapata to oversee the clinic’s expanded programs. Staffers at the clinic also helped pen an additional amicus brief opposing Trump's order. In short, it’s been a hectic month. Maggie J. Morgan ’04, a clinical and advocacy fellow overseeing students at the clinic, said that although it is still unclear how the executive orders will play out, there is already much to do to support clients...As part of its approach to immigration and refugee rights issues, the clinic, in conjunction with the Harvard Immigration Project—a student practice organization at the Law School—has launched the Immigration Response Initiative, an umbrella project with nine sub-projects. Among its other initiatives, members of the project have created a sanctuary campus toolkit and FAQ for students about the immigration executive order, according to Amy E. Volz '18, a Law School student and the co-president of HIP...The clinic also released a report Wednesday called “The Impact of President Trump’s Executive Orders on Asylum Seekers,” written by staff and students affiliated with the clinic...The report has already gained significant traction in Canada, where legislators are considering suspending the refugee agreement, clinic director and Law School professor Deborah E. Anker said.

Affiliates from across Harvard affected by President Donald Trump’s immigration order voiced concerns and posed questions to University administrators and staff at a town hall event Wednesday...Martin and Jason M. Corral, an immigration attorney, fielded questions from the audience. Harvard Law School’s Immigration and Refugee Clinic recently hired Corral to offer legal counsel to those impacted by Trump’s immigration policies—a part of a series of steps Faust laid out in November to bolster resources for Harvard affiliates...“We’ll try to be as transparent as possible, but at the same time respect individuals and preserve confidentiality,” Corral said when asked about whether the University would communicate with the Harvard community about the status of affected individuals. Corral offered up his business card and pledged to continue working with clients even after they graduate.