Sarah Grosse Perdekamp’s goal is to help non-citizens through what she says is now an inhumane immigration court system
Byline: By Kinsey Gade (Data Editor)
Sarah Grosse Perdekamp, a second-year law student at the University of Minnesota Law School, recently sat in Fort Snelling Immigration Court as part of a federal immigration clinic. She said she was disheartened by what she saw.
“The judges call people by numbers,” Grosse Perdekamp said. “It’s really dehumanizing,”
Grosse Perdekamp’s parents immigrated to the U.S. from Freiburg, Germany, on work visas in the 1990s. They have been green card holders since, but have recently decided to apply for U.S. citizenship after watching President Donald Trump announce several anti-immigrant executive orders.
Although her parents’ journey is quite different from many of the clients she works with in the law school’s federal immigration litigation clinic, where students gain experience by providing legal services to non-citizens, Grosse Perdekamp knows that the court proceedings she encounters can be extensive and confusing to her clients, most of whom are not proficient in English. .
“I think the saddest part is that [court officials] see this day in and day out, and that’s their new reality, but it also makes them out of touch with the humanizing aspects of these people,” Grosse Perdekamp said.
The clinic works to combat the inhumane nature of the courts and humanize Grosse Perdekamp’s clients by offering resources, translators, explanations about the legal process and by naming their non-citizen clients in the drafting of briefs and motions.
Grosse Perdekamp first became interested in law after working as a court observer in the Coles County Drug Court Program the summer before college. The program replaces drug offenders’ long-term sentences of up to 15 years with a two-year court-ordered rehabilitation program.
“It is much more rehabilitative and has a much higher success rate than if they were to go to prison,” Grosse Perdekamp said. “That was just incredibly exciting.”
Out of the program’s dozens of graduates between October 2016 and March 2022, only eight reoffended—a recidivism rate of 15%.
Grosse Perdekamp interned this past summer with the Advocates for Human Rights, an organization that represents and assists non-citizens with immigration issues. She also serves as vice president of the International Law Society.
Micah Winters, a second-year university law student and president of the International Law Society, said Grosse Perdekamp shows respect to each client and colleague through her honest communication and work ethic.
“She is the best kind of vice president we can have,” Winters said. “I have total confidence in her that whatever she takes on, she’s going to do and do well.”
This upcoming summer, Grosse Perdekamp will be working on an eight-person German team at Baker Donelson, working on cross-border business transactions with Austrian, German and Swiss clients. In the future, she hopes to use her legal degree to work with German companies but will always partake in immigration work.
“Anywhere I go, I will do pro bono work in the immigration field,” Grosse Perdekamp said. “I think that’s a way to further your positive work for the community and non-citizens.”