Carmen Maria Rey Caldas is an attorney with over 20 years of experience in humanitarian immigration who most recently served as an Immigration Judge with the U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review. Prior to that role, Carmen, herself an immigrant to the U.S., was the U.S. Legal Director at the International Refugee Assistance Project, a nonprofit organization that provides legal advocacy for refugees and displaced people around the world who are in need of a safe place to call home. Carmen has also served as Legal Director of Sanctuary for Families’ immigration unit and as Assistant Professor of Clinical Law and Co-Director of the Safe Harbor Immigration Clinic at Brooklyn Law School. At Sanctuary, she led efforts to defend immigrant survivors of gender-based violence before federal immigration agencies and federal courts. A graduate of New York University and Brooklyn Law School, she has authored several articles and reports on humanitarian immigration, and likes to spend her free time running (at an ever-slower pace), and spending quality time with her dogs, Lola (a Potcake born in The Bahamas), and Bella (a Labrador Retriever born in the U.S.) Lola and Bella are both very good dogs.
