By Andrew Cohen
Our annual Summer Work Series features Berkeley Law students reflecting on their current job. These first-person accounts detail career-advancing work and skill building in many legal areas, often through opportunities gained in partnership with the Career Development Office.
Rising 3L Holden Valentine’s immigration-focused summer is a natural extension of his burgeoning career passion. He previously conducted client interviews in Spanish and helped provide other pro bono immigration services to indigent people in removal proceedings as an intern with Pangea Legal Services, was a student advocate in Berkeley Law’s International Refugee Assistance Project, and took part in the school’s Immigration Liberation Practicum.
Valentine is also the co-leader of the Berkeley Law & Organizing Collective, which provides research and training to independent workers trying to unionize, and has been a member of Ecology Law Quarterly.
Below, he describes his ongoing summer work with the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office Immigration Defense Unit.
As secret police conduct raids on our communities and detention centers crop up across the California desert, the law can often feel powerless against the machinery of deportation. Yet, this summer, I learned that legal removal defense work can be more than just a hand reaching out of the darkness, but a concrete way to free people from incarceration, keep families together, defend human dignity, and resist the rise of fascism in the United States.
It is the most important application of the law today and I am humbled to be a part of the struggle as a Berkeley Law student, a summer intern at the San Francisco Public Defender’s Immigration Defense Unit, and an aspiring immigration attorney.
When I started law school, I felt drawn to immigration defense, but I did not yet know where to begin. At the same time, the political landscape around immigration was changing rapidly, and the law itself felt deliberately and increasingly difficult to navigate.
I was fortunate to find the Immigration Liberation Practicum, run through Berkeley Law’s Criminal Law & Justice Center and taught by Chesa Boudin and Sophia Wang, where I learned practical, immediately deployable skills that could make a direct difference in people’s lives.
Many of our clients were fighting removal while detained in remote facilities far from their families and communities. Through the practicum, other students and I drafted habeas corpus petitions challenging unlawful and prolonged detention. In several cases, our work helped to free clients from horrific conditions in detention centers run by private prison companies.
The experience was deeply empowering and rewarding, but it also reminded me of the tremendous strength and resolve of people on the inside. I quickly learned that being an advocate means to be guided by those who courageously fight for justice, even in the most brutal of conditions.
Crossing a new bridge
This summer, I’ve brought those skills and experiences to the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office Immigration Defense Unit. Because habeas petitions are complex and often fall outside the ordinary scope of removal defense, I was able to help meet an urgent need within the unit.
With the foundation Berkeley Law gave me, I could support attorneys and clients by helping with habeas drafting, strategy, and research. What started for me as a strange and unfamiliar area of law became an immediate way to contribute meaningfully to my summer internship and the clients we serve.
At the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, I am deeply grateful for the incredible mentors around me. At times, the responsibilities I have — even as an intern — can feel daunting. The stakes are extraordinarily high, and the caseload can feel overwhelming, especially since San Francisco is one of the few counties in the country that provides legal representation to undocumented clients in immigration proceedings.
In spite of the tough circumstances, my mentors trust my judgment and lead by example, approaching the work with grace, intelligence, compassion, and real fighting spirit. I know that I could not have found a better place to spend my 2L summer.
Now, the scope of my work has expanded from habeas petitions. In just a few weeks, I will appear on the record for the first time at a bond hearing. I am also helping file a motion to enforce, draft a motion to reopen, prepare an opening brief before the Ninth Circuit, write client declarations, and conduct check-in calls with clients in detention. I learn so much each day I step into the office.
This summer has solidified for me that immigration defense work is what I want to do with my legal career. It is proof that even in a system designed to dehumanize people, we can still fight back and bring people home.
Nowadays, I can feel my feet on the ground in the fight for justice and I know I can carry this fire with me throughout my future. I am so tremendously grateful for this summer.