Tom Jawetz

Tom Jawetz (@TomJawetz) is a senior fellow for Immigration Policy at American Progress and an independent consultant. From 2021-2022, Tom served as deputy general counsel of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Prior to that, Tom was the vice president of Immigration Policy at American Progress and chief counsel on the Immigration Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee. He has testified multiple times before the U.S. House of Representatives and advised members of Congress and congressional staff on all areas of immigration law and policy.

Prior to his time at the Judiciary Committee, Tom worked as the immigration detention staff attorney at the National Prison Project of the ACLU. There, he represented immigration detainees in class action and individual challenges to unlawful conditions of confinement and investigated abuses in Louisiana jails and prisons during and after Hurricane Katrina. He previously represented asylum seekers in judicial and administrative proceedings with the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs and served as a law clerk to the Hon. Kimba M. Wood of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Tom holds a bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and a J.D. from the Yale Law School.