Mintz Levin Pro Bono Chair Sue Finegan was attending a Saturday evening gala at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts when she received an urgent phone call from Susan Church, chair of the New England Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. It was January 28, 2017, the day after President Trump signed the executive order for his administration’s first travel ban, and Church needed legal help at Logan Airport, where some incoming travelers had been detained by US Customs and Border Protection officials. The president’s initial order blocked travelers from seven countries (Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen) and encompassed green-card and visa holders—wreaking havoc with travel throughout the world. “My husband and I, and Mintz Levin legal intern Merry Sheehan, literally dropped everything, raced out of the gala, and jumped into a taxi, leaving our coats and valeted cars behind,” Finegan said. Church’s request, though a little untimely, wasn’t entirely unexpected. “Susan Cohen, chair of Mintz Levin’s Immi- gration Practice, and I had been getting updates from Susan Church over the course of the day, alerting us that a legal challenge to the travel ban might be filed, and we discussed the potential of Mintz Levin getting involved as pro bono counsel,” Finegan said. Earlier Church had also spoken with ACLU of Massachusetts Executive Director Matthew Segal to update him on what was happening at the airport, as the ACLU was mounting legal challenges to the ban in several cities. At the airport, where thousands of protesters had gath- ered, Finegan met up with Church and other attorneys. There, they learned that a complaint was in the process of being filed on behalf of two lawful Massachusetts residents— professors from the University of Massachusetts, returning to Boston—who were being detained. There was a rumor that a federal judge was on the way to the airport. When the legal team learned that the judge would instead hear the case at Boston’s John Joseph Moakley US Courthouse, the group headed there. It was hardly business as usual. “At first we couldn’t get into the courthouse,” Finegan said. The group of mostly female attorneys, and some members of the press, waited outside in the bitter cold for 15 to 20 minutes before they were allowed entrance. Joined by Cohen, herself racing from a friend’s birthday party, the assembled attorneys began to help Segal and Church craft the arguments for the temporary injunction. But no one had come prepared for a full evening’s work, let alone a court appearance. “The only person dressed appropriately was Matt,” Finegan said. One attorney had been hiking all day. Another had borrowed a pair of shoes that didn’t fit. As people used their cell phones to research case law and draft filings, the phones started to die, and only one person had a charger. Since documents have to be filed electronically in the federal docketing system, Church’s husband, a lawyer, was put to work filing various Quick Teamwork on the Travel Ban 11 (continued) “We will never say it enough: just how grateful we are for the critical representation Mintz Levin provided on the Massachusetts case. These are issues of profound existential importance to Oxfam and the people we serve. It is the human face of these policies that you represent. They need you. And thank you, as we do.” Robert Silverman Senior Advisor for Private Sector Oxfam America