New Orleans law school trains students in 'deportation defense' for illegal aliens
Tulane University School of Law runs an 'Immigrants’ Rights Law Clinic' that allows students to earn course credit for working with licensed attorneys to defend illegal aliens facing removal from the United States.
Louisiana reportedly holds the second-highest number of detained illegal immigrants in the country, according to TRAC Immigration data.
As the Trump administration jails illegal aliens in the newly expanded “Louisiana Lockup” detention facility, one New Orleans law school is training its students to fight those deportations in court.
Tulane University School of Law in New Orleans, Louisiana, runs an “Immigrants’ Rights Law Clinic” that allows students to earn course credit for working with licensed attorneys to defend illegal aliens facing removal from the United States.
“Tulane students will be on the front lines of advocating on behalf of local immigrant communities,” said Laila Hlass, immigration law professor at Tulane Law School.
Students in the legal clinic take courses “focused on deportation defense” and “represent detainees, migrant workers, children and other immigrants with critical legal needs working through the U.S. Immigration system,” the course description reads.
[RELATED: University of Nebraska disavows ICE’s new ‘Cornhusker Clink’ detention center]
Tulane offers the course “Immigration Detention & Removal,” which trains students in the “removal defense of immigrants.” Another course, “Hot Topics: Breaking Changes in Immigration Law and Policy,” examines immigration enforcement under the Trump administration and how its “approach to deportation” will impact illegal immigrants.
Tulane’s legal clinic aims to serve the population of illegal immigrant detainees in Louisiana, especially those in remote locations like the Louisiana Lockup facility.
A 2020 university webpage noted that “the state’s prominence in the unfolding national immigration crisis will continue to grow as the federal government has more than doubled the number of detention beds in Louisiana since September 2018 alone.”
It added that “the remote location of the state’s detention centers compounds the challenges for detainees in accessing lawyers and defending their rights.” Tulane’s law clinic was created to address those challenges.
“The new clinic is needed now more than ever to confront the unprecedented expansion of immigration detention in this state,” a university webpage states.
Louisiana reportedly holds the second-highest number of detained illegal immigrants in the country, following Texas, according to TRAC Immigration data from August 2025.
In cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Louisiana operates the Louisiana Lockup facility, which the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says will house “some of the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens including murderers, rapists, pedophiles, drug traffickers, and gang members.”
The Immigrants’ Rights Law Clinic launched in 2020 with support from a $400,000 donation from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, which is described as a “left-of-center grantmaking organization” by Influence Watch. The foundation reportedly has over $11 billion in assets and also funds left-leaning initiatives related to abortion and systematic racism.
According to the university, the clinic “will work for reform in immigration law” and intends to host “know your rights” trainings. Campus Reform has reported that similar trainings on other campuses teach illegal immigrants how to resist federal immigration enforcement.
In addition to the law clinic, Tulane provides “free legal advice and low-cost representation” to illegal immigrant students through the Tulane University Legal Assistance Program (TULAP), funded by student fees.
Prior to launching the Immigrants’ Rights Law Clinic, Tulane offered a course called “Immigration Detention and Removal Defense,” which taught students “the process and laws applying to detention and removal defense of immigrants,” according to the course description.
Campus Reform has contacted the parties mentioned in this article for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
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