Under the Trump Era “Zero-Tolerance” Immigration Policy, thousands of children were separated from their parents by ICE agents. As a human rights lawyer in Southern Texas, Efrén C. Olivares represented hundreds of theses families. He has now written a memoir that intertwines the stories of the people he has fought for with his own immigration experience.

Efrén joins us to discuss his new book, My Boy Will Die of Sorrow: A Memoir of Immigration From the Front Lines. He also tells us about what immigrants at the southern border are currently facing.

Efrén C. Olivares is the Deputy Legal Director of the Immigrant Justice Project at Southern Poverty Law Center. He was the lead lawyer in a successful landmark petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on behalf of families separated under the Zero Tolerance policy. He has testified before Congress and at briefings on Capitol Hill about immigration and border policies. He previously directed the Racial and Economic Justice Program at the Texas Civil Rights Project. His writings have been published by the New York Times, USA Today, and Newsweek.. Part of his work representing separated families was featured in the CBS News Documentary The Faces of Family Separation, released in 2019. 

Photo by Greg Bulla on Unsplash

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