General Attorney (Information and Privacy Law)
What you'd do
Join a dynamic team of information law attorneys providing fast-paced legal advice and guidance to clients at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA) Government Information Law Division (GILD) as Counsel and leverage your legal experience to protect the homeland in this ever-evolving area of law.
Major duties
OPLA is the largest legal program in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), employing over 3,000 attorneys nationwide to provide a full range of legal services to all ICE programs and offices. OPLA's Enforcement, General Law, and Litigation (EG&L) divisions, through close client engagement, advance ICE's homeland security and public safety mission by providing expert legal advice and guidance to ICE personnel enforcing our nation's immigration, customs, and criminal law and policies. Counsel in EG&L also defend the operational authorities and decisions of ICE officers and agents in federal courts and support the advocacy of ICE attorneys before immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals, with special emphasis on cases involving criminal aliens, human rights violators, and aliens who threaten our national security. EG&L divisions also advise and provide legal and prudential counsel to an array of operational and policy clients within ICE on contracts, fiscal, and information law issues, as well as ethics and regulatory matters. GILD attorneys advise all ICE program offices on matters relating to the disclosure of agency information, both within DHS and to external entities. Specifically, they support agency compliance with legal obligations under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the Privacy Act of 1974 (PA), the E-Government Act of 2002, the Federal Records Act of 1950, and the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995. GILD adjudicates administrative FOIA appeals and assists U.S. Attorneys' Offices in defending information-related litigation under the FOIA, PA, and the Administrative Procedure Act. GILD attorneys also engage with local law enforcement about state sunshine laws and disclosure of information, coordinate responses to agency requests for information, respond to congressional inquiries, and review ICE information-sharing agreements with external agencies. Selected attorneys will immediately be given significant responsibilities and will be expected to craft persuasive, legally supportable positions to address the needs of agency operational components. Selected attorneys will be expected to routinely provide timely legal opinions to ICE officers and agents, division management, and leadership within OPLA, ICE, and the DHS Office of the General Counsel Headquarters.
What you need to qualify
Applicants should be able to efficiently produce quality legal analyses of complex and novel issues, exercise sound legal judgment, prioritize competing assignments, and work effectively independently, as part of a team, and across work units. Applicants should be detail-oriented and have a strong interest in supporting and providing stellar client services to program offices, including law enforcement officers, policymakers, attorneys, and agency senior leadership, and must be able to tailor communications to a particular audience. Applicants should be able to take initiative and work in a reliable, decisive, and professional manner. Applicants should possess the following characteristics and competencies: integrity, sound professional judgment, organizational skills, decisiveness, initiative, stellar client services, the ability to function independently and cooperatively, and superior written and oral advocacy skills.
Before you apply
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