Professor Wadhia authors immigration chapter in COVID-19 legal text

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia, Samuel Weiss Faculty Scholar and Clinical Professor of Law at Penn State Law in University Park, has written a chapter on immigration law in a new legal textbook covering issues surrounding the current global COVID-19 pandemic, published by Columbia Law School.

The book, Law in the Time of COVID-19, covers a wide range of legal topics, including bankruptcy, prisoners’ rights, public health law, and more, under the lens of the ongoing pandemic and its consequences. Wadhia’s immigration law chapter, Immigration in the Time of COVID-19, discusses the huge impact that the crisis has had on the immigration system, with many changes implemented by the administration in a short time period across immigration enforcement, border enforcement, and immigration benefits agency-by-agency. The entire e-book is available for free download online.

Wadhia’s research focuses on the role of prosecutorial discretion in immigration law and the intersections of race, national security, and immigration. She has published more than thirty law review articles, book chapters, and essays on immigration law. Her work has been published in Emory Law Journal; Texas Law Review; Washington and Lee Law Review, Columbia Journal of Race and Law; Notice & Comment, Yale Journal on Regulation; Harvard Latino Law Review; Connecticut Public Interest Law Journal; Georgetown Immigration Law Journal; and Howard Law Journal. Wadhia’s first book, Beyond Deportation: The Role of Prosecutorial Discretion in Immigration Cases, was published by New York University Press in 2015 and named an honorable mention for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. Her second book, Banned: Immigration Enforcement in the Time of Trump, was released on September 10, 2019, by New York University Press.

At Penn State Law, Professor Wadhia teaches doctrinal courses in immigration and asylum and refugee law. She is also the founder/director of the Center for Immigrants’ Rights Clinic (CIRC), where she supervises students in three areas: 1) community outreach; 2) legal support in individual immigration cases; and 3) policy work for institutional clients. CIRC has earned a national reputation for its high-quality work product and impact in the community.