Immigration Relief: An Introduction

Habiba Simjee recently joined Counsel for Justice as the organization’s first Director of Pro Bono. She previously served as a Program Director at OneJustice, providing training, coaching and support to leaders in the legal aid sector – with a particular focus on maximizing the impact of immigration legal services organizations. She began her legal career at the intersection of immigrant rights and access to higher education, providing free immigration legal services to undocumented and mixed-status students and families within the University of California system. This included work at the UC Immigrant Legal Services Center at UCLA and, previously, at UC Santa Barbara, where she also served as the inaugural Undocumented Student Services program director. Since 2023, Habiba has further contributed to legal education as an adjunct professor at the University of La Verne College of Law & Public Service, teaching immigration law and co-professoring in the Justice and Immigration Clinic. Habiba earned her law degree from Berkeley Law and completed her undergraduate education at UC San Diego.