Join the Penn State Law Center for Immigrants’ Rights Clinic for a discussion on President Trump's executive orders on immigration and related litigation featuring:

• Abed A. Ayoub, National Legal and Policy Director, American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
• Johnathan Smith, Legal Director, Muslim Advocates

The speakers will also discuss the status of the anti-Arab/Muslim discrimination in the U.S., the mission and work of their organizations, and how to get involved in their advocacy efforts.

About the Speakers

Johnathan Smith serves as legal director at Muslim Advocates. Smith previously served in the Obama administration as senior counsel to the assistant attorney general in the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division, where he helped manage the division’s work on religious discrimination, LGBT rights, employment discrimination, housing discrimination, and appellate matters. Smith has also previously served as a staff attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, where he worked on matters involving employment discrimination, housing discrimination, criminal justice reform, and environmental justice. He is a graduate of NYU School of Law, the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and Harvard College.

Abed A. Ayoub is the national legal and policy director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC). As a native of Dearborn, Michigan, Ayoub grew up in a town with the largest concentration of Arab Americans in the U.S. Ayoub joined ADC’s Michigan Office in 2002, as the membership and development Coordinator. In 2007, he joined the ADC national office. In addition to his work for ADC, Ayoub was in private practice that specialized in immigration and criminal law. Throughout his career, he has engaged in numerous interfaith projects and diversity training programs throughout Michigan. He holds a B.A. in corporate communication and public relations from the University of Michigan and a J.D. from the University of Detroit-Mercy School of Law. 

About the Sponsors

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee is the largest Arab American grassroots organization in the United States that fights to protect the civil rights and liberties of people of Arab descent. ADC aims to battle stereotypes and discrimination faced by any person belonging to the American Arab community in the United States.

Muslim Advocates (MA) is a national legal advocacy and educational organization that aims at providing freedom and justice for Americans of all faiths. In particular, MA works to combat the anti-Muslim rhetoric and discrimination faced by the American Muslim community.

The Penn State Law Center for Immigrants' Rights Clinic is an in-house clinic in which students work under the guidance of Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia. The clinic has recently collaborated with MA and ADC to draft fact sheets and summaries on President Donald Trump’s immigration executive orders. These and other documents are available at the clinic’s post-election web page.