Bio
Jessica Karp Bansal is a Senior Staff Attorney at the ACLU of Southern California. Jessica specializes in immigrants’ rights litigation and policy advocacy. Her work includes challenging dangerous immigrant detention during the COVID-19 pandemic in Hernandez Roman v. Wolf, challenging unconstitutional immigration enforcement practices in Gonzalez v. ICE, ensuring immigrants with serious mental disorders have access to counsel in removal proceedings in Franco v. Sessions, defending the rights of Temporary Protected Status holders in Ramos v. Nielsen, and advocating on behalf of immigrants in Orange County, California.
Prior to joining ACLU, Jessica served as the Co-Legal Director at the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. She was awarded a Soros Justice Fellowship in 2012 to organize privacy, justice, and immigrants’ rights advocates against the “Secure Communities” deportation program. She has also served as an Adjunct Professor with the Immigrant Rights Clinic at the Irvine School of Law and a law clerk for the Honorable Stephen Reinhardt on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Jessica received her J.D. from Columbia Law School and her B.A. from Wesleyan University.
Featured work
Jun 9, 2021
Mass ICE Detention is Unnecessary — and We Have Proof
