< Previousing case and second as a plaintiff attorney in a business litigation dispute. “Allowing a third-year to try a case by her- self is just unheard of in defense firms,” she says. “I won them both.” She says she soon developed a passion for the three partners’ areas of law, especially the business litigation work. “It’s always different, it’s always challenging, and it’s always factually and legally unique,” she says. “No two contracts are the same, no two business models are the same, and no two clients’ needs are the same.” That might also be said of another third of her casework: truck accidents. Haight is part of an organization called ALFA International, which provides immediate, 24-hour, 365-day- a-year legal representation for trucking com- panies and their insurers in the event of a sig- nificant or catastrophic crash. For Mijanovic, who was asked to be part of the team as a young associate, that can mean interruptions in the middle of holidays, on vacations away and in the middle of any weeknight to drive to the far reaches of the Southland—often to remote desert highways—to interview drivers involved. She is al- ways on call and ready to take one. “There’s no question that there’s sacrifice,” she says of the role. “But from the outset, I really made an effort to do more than sit at my desk, bill my hours and pick up my paycheck. “It was a hands-on approach to getting myself more involved in things the firm was doing and also getting involved with AFLA International,” she says. “I made an effort to make myself more available to the programs the firm was offering, and it also helped put my face out there.” Again, she says, attitude was key to taking on the extra work. “If you don’t see it as an opportunity, you’ll miss it,” she says. “I al- ways saw it as an opportunity the firm was giving me and it helped me “It’s decreasing the amount of stress to the folks who need training on the fundamentals,” she says, “and it’s saving partners from having to train the younger folks.” “It’s always different, it’s always challenging, and it’s always factually and legally unique.” ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · LOS ANGELES · VOL. 5 NO. 5 10thrive in this job.” Another opportunity putting Mijanovic’s face out there is running the Little Red Schoolhouse continuing-education program at the firm, which was started by Bill Haight in 1972 for in-house attorneys to ex- pand their knowledge. She comes up with topics and lines up present- ers, and she presents some of the classes herself. A year-round program offering two courses per month on Wednesdays at noon, she explains the fall courses are particularly ideal for first-year lawyers and current clerks who haven’t taken the bar exam yet. When the new year starts in January, the sylla- bus is targeted toward more advanced, niche topics for the senior associates and junior partners. “Personally, me taking over the Little Red School- house is right in my wheelhouse,” she says. “It was the natural next step after creating the firm’s mentor- ship for newly minted lawyers.” Mijanovic, recalling her own stumbles as an ju- nior associate, had sought to streamline the now- more-formalized training and mentorship of new attorneys at the firm. “As a first-year associate, I had to walk into the managing partner’s office and ask him what I thought were dumb questions,” she says. Speaking with other associates, she realized they felt the same way and a better plan was born. Today, junior associates are officially as- signed to individual senior associates who can answer all their questions. “It’s decreasing the amount of stress to the folks who need training on the fundamen- tals,” she says, “and it’s saving partners from having to train the younger folks.” Even as a younger folk herself, Mijan- ovic was drawn toward practicing law. The daughter of immigrants with no women professionals in the family for guidance, she set her sights toward the career as early as junior high. She took her first case—repre- senting herself—shortly after she moved out on her own at 18, suing her landlord for retalia- tory eviction of her and her sister, with whom she lived. The day of the court proceedings, the landlord claimed he wasn’t ready and the judge agreed to reschedule the hearing. That didn’t sit right with Mijanovic. “I said to the judge, ‘He was served; he knew of this complaint. We can’t afford to take more time off work for this. He should have been pre- pared,’” she recalls. The judge turned to her with a smirk on her face and the case went forward. “That feeling I will never forget, and that’s when I knew I wanted to do that for the rest of my life,” she says. “I won that small claims trial, too.” It was around this time that Mijanovic met her future co-workers at Haight. The attorney who got her in as a summer associate? Her now-hus- The Young Women’s Leadership Conference is one of many pro bono activities for young women and children from under-resourced communities in which Mijanovic takes part. AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 11At a Glance Haight Brown & Bonesteel 555 S. Flower Street 45th Floor Los Angeles 90071 (213) 542-8000 www.hbblaw.com Practice Areas Business Solutions Product Liability Transportation Bar Admissions California U.S. District Court, Central District of California U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California U.S. District Court, Northern District of California U.S. District Court, Southern District of California U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit Education Juris Doctor, Southwestern Law School, 2009 Bachelor of Arts, University of California at Berkeley, 2005 Professional Membership National Association of Women Business Owners Pro Bono The Young Women’s Leadership Conference through the Los Angeles Superior Court and The I Have a Dream Foundation. Hobbies DIY Home Improvement Travel Snowboarding Spending Time With Family Favorite Quote “It is not the critic who counts.” – Theodore Roosevelt band, fellow Haight partner Krsto Mijanovic, whom she started dating at 19 when she was an employee at a retail store and he was a customer persistent for a date. They’ve been together now for 18 years and share a 2-year-old son. “I attended one or two Christmas parties with Krsto and met ev- eryone before I was actually in law school,” she says. “When I was in law school, I asked them, ‘So, are you guys going to let me work here?’ “I always saw and knew the firm in a different way from others who came over as laterals and didn’t have any association with the firm,” she adds. “It has kind of always been my family.” And now she’s an even more important member of that family. Pro- moted to partner in January 2019, Mijanovic’s workload has increased further because now she devotes time to helping run the firm, but that’s about all that has changed. “I don’t feel a significant difference because I never saw myself as just an associate and I never treated the firm as just my place of em- ployment,” she says. “Absent the title change, I don’t believe I acted any different in how I approach the work I do or how I see my role at the firm and my investment in the firm.” It’s not a job for anyone, nor is it a place for everyone, she says. “I think you have to have a calling to do this kind of work,” says Mi- janovic. “It requires a lot of sacrifice, and putting the clients’ and firm’s needs ahead of your own.” She says that in observing the people who have been at Haight for decades, she believes they have the calling, too. “I wanted to find a career and a place to work that felt like that,” she says. “Haight was it. In my heart of hearts, I know I am exactly where I am supposed to be.” ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · LOS ANGELES · VOL. 5 NO. 5 12Do you ever wonder what the professional traits of your website visi- tors are? If so, you can utilize the LinkedIn Website Demographics tool to get useful data and insights about the people that visit your law firm’s website. The LinkedIn insight tag consists of a snippet of JavaScript code that you would add to your website. This tool gives you access to Website Demographics, which is a tool that provides more information about your website visitors. In order to use this tool, you do need to set up a LinkedIn ads account. However, you do not have to run ads in order to get access to the insights. The first step is to go to your LinkedIn ads account and install the insight tag. You can do this by hovering over the account assets tab and then selecting Insight Tag. Once you have done that, you can either install it yourself if you know how or have your Web developer set it up. Another option for setup is to utilize Google Tag Manager. Additional Sites If you have more than one website for your law firm, you can also add it to each individual website if you want to track data from those sites, as well. Although LinkedIn won’t disclose any personal information about an individual in order to adhere to privacy policies, it will provide data about your website visitors’ job titles and responsibilities, industry information, company names and sizes, and more. The advantage of having this data available is that you can later use it to build your LinkedIn or Facebook Marketing campaigns. There are some key points to keep in mind when it comes to interpreting the data from LinkedIn Website Demographics: 1. The data include both paid traffic and visits from social media posts, public relations and additional sources. 2. Data will only be provided for individuals who have LinkedIn accounts. If an individual or company is not in the LinkedIn database, you will not get data from that segment. 3. The data only take website visits into account and not form or list subscriptions. Furthermore, you can filter data based on job function, job title, company, industry, job seniority, company size, location and country. Once you have access to this valuable data, you can use it to tailor your website and blog content to your target audience. In addition, you can use these insights to build out customer personas. The Next Way The second way to utilize LinkedIn for your law firm marketing is to create video content for LinkedIn. One of the easiest ways to come up with video content for LinkedIn is to repurpose your existing YouTube videos by posting them on LinkedIn. There really is not a preferred video format for LinkedIn; you can shoot the video in square, vertical or horizontal. Even if your videos are uploaded on YouTube, you should edit the original video files as LinkedIn prefers native content rather than direct links to YouTube. If you have a 30-minute video, you can take it and split it into short 1- to 2-minute segments. Currently, the maximum minutes LinkedIn allows is 10. An additional tip is to add timestamps to your video description so the viewers can forward to the part that they are the most interested in. For the file format, make sure to use the MP4 format because it allows you to add a title, a custom thumbnail and SRT file (which helps optimize your post). LinkedIn’s metrics for video are not as robust as Facebook’s. However, LinkedIn is in the process of acquiring data companies in an effort to add additional features to its video analytics. You don’t have to limit your content to videos; you can create text posts, PDFs and links to other resources and content. Another way to increase engagement on LinkedIn is to ask questions of your audience and get their feedback. The more content you create, the more your viewers on LinkedIn will begin to recognize you and your firm. You can create an online persona that allows people to view you as an expert in your practice area by providing valuable content. Also, don’t forget to ask them to share your content or follow you on other social media channels. Take the time to craft a specific law firm marketing strategy for each social media channel. DIMPLE DANG | Legal Marketing Dimple Dang is a marketing director at Activist Legal, which provides a nationwide network of experienced at- torneys who handle foreclosure files. Her experience in marketing includes website design, email marketing, SEO, blogging, PPC, social media, HubSpot and Facebook marketing complains. She is a law firm marketing specialist and entrepreneur and speaks at many professional groups and organizations all over the United States. To connect with Dimple, send her a message on LinkedIn. Two Ways to Utilize LinkedIn as a Marketing Tool for Your Law Firm AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 13As a youth, I recall anxiously waiting to watch Ameri- can Bandstand on Sat- urday mornings. For me, American Bandstand was all about who had the most innovative dance moves and who had on the best outfits that made them memorable. It was obvious that these dancers had their personal brands top of mind in their attempt to out-work and out- dress their counterparts. Looking back, I see the show as American “Brand” Stand. Back in those days, competition was fierce, since dressing was a symbol of status and influence. In 2019, how- ever, it is rather easy to out-dress your counterparts, with the proliferation of Casual Fridays and their spreading to the rest of the week. First Impressions Just because other firms are dressed casually day to day doesn’t mean that we all have to comply and follow suit (pun intended). People expect leaders to lead with style and grace. Imagine what your prospective or new client is expecting your person- al brand to be when you first come around the corner to great them. Even if they were expecting you to be in Khakis and a polo shirt, I don’t think they would be disappointed if you were dressed to da nines. I can tell you from experience that I was in the same situation once, with a friend who was the prospective client. The attorney came around the corner dressed sloppily, and I looked at my friend and said, “If that’s your attor ney, you lost!” I was only 17 at the time, so what did I know? But it turns out that I was wise beyond my years. Now more than three decades later, I have attor ney clients who tell me, “If I’m going to bill $600/hour, then I have to look like I’m worth $600/hour.” Being well dressed is always worth the price. Worth the Investment There’s a story about a young lawyer who did not have any clients. What he did have was the wherewithal to know that he needed to save and in- vest in a fine custom navy suit (that he wore everywhere, by the way). The young attorney would go and merely stand in the local courthouse clad in the aforementioned suit. He had indi- viduals approaching him saying, “You look like you are a successful attorney. Can you please represent me?” This young counselor figured out how to expand his ways and means of marketing himself by appearing as a person of influence. Our personal brand is the mark we leave on people we encounter. It could even be the impression we add aesthetically to the environment via our clothing. The mega brands under- stand the value of consistent brand- ing, and so should we. Since the world is complicated, moving at such a fast pace, it be- hooves us to be noticed and to remain visible and relevant in your particular marketplace, just like the big brands and firms. One of my clients says that he keeps it super simple by focusing on how he can convey his gregarious personality, rather than immediately concentrating on the firm, per se. “My firm speaks for itself,” he says. “I have to guarantee that my image is congruent and in alignment with the firm’s image.” Branders Generally speaking, brands are cre- ated on the edges with the assistance of a PR firm and advertising agency. Sartorially speaking, personal brands are created and designed with the help of a trusted wardrobe advisor. Most high-performing profession- als hire experts and coaches, be it for financial or personal growth. The professional that is determined to leave no stone unturned probably has someone who is accountable for their image and wardrobe. Believe it or not, Michael Jackson entrusted his brand to a surfer by the name of Mike Salisbury. He told a youthful MJ to sport one white glove with a tuxedo, because both gloves would be “too Mickey Mouse.” That was the beginning of The King of Pop, as we knew him. MJ will always be remembered for tilting and flinging his fedora. How- ever, according to Huffingtonpost. com, “No one tilted his fedora better, wore a bow tie cooler and made a suit look so effortless” than Frank Sinatra. Yes, it may have seemed effortless, but the best nonchalant dresser has inten- tionality in what they want to convey to their audience and world. So, whether you are on your way to becoming a global icon or already a seasoned professional or just out of law school, dress as if you are a subject matter expert about to perform on American Brand Stand. Because pay- ing attention to your personal brand and looking like you mean business is the ultimate financial leverage. Trent Clark designs and creates custom and high-end off-the-rack images for suc- cessful individuals as a wardrobe artist at custom clothier Upper Echelon. He can be reached at trentclark@upperechelonltd. com and (562) 500-6348. What American Bandstand Teaches us About Image By Trent Clark ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · LOS ANGELES · VOL. 5 NO. 5 14Do you remember when you first decided to become a lawyer? Was it when you were a kid, and everyone said you’d make a great lawyer because you liked to “debate” everything? Maybe it was from seeing injustice in the world? Or a family member was an attorney? Whether you went right to law school from college or returned after a being out in the world, it took a lot to get where you are. Remember how excit- ing it was that day you were handed your diploma, or passed the Bar? And yet, everyone knows a lawyer who is miserable or who has left the profes- sion. So why do lawyers have such high job dissatisfaction? Somewhere along the way, the pol- ish of the passion somehow faded to a jaded day-to-day existence. Maybe it was when you found that while striving to be successful and save the world (or just your clients), you were spending 10 or 12 hours a day or some 2,100 hours a year managing a large workload, dealing with the daily grind of client/management demands and having to meet grueling dead- lines and it was no longer the dream you had imagined. Where is the Joy? A.T. Kearney conducted a Joy at Work study in December 2018 and they found that nearly 90% of respon- dents said that they expected to experi- ence a substantial degree of joy at work, yet only 37% report that such is their actual experience. Lack of joy, purpose and meaning can contribute to gen- eral dissatisfaction as well as stress and burnout. Lawyers struggling with ca- reer burnout, stress, and the drive for financial and professional success are the leading factors for depression and substance abuse, according to the 2016 Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation and ABA comprehensive study, The Jour- nal of Addiction Medicine study. ELLEN COHEN | Legal Coach Ellen Cohen, JD, CPCC, PCC., is an executive coach and attorney. She is certified by CTI and International Coach Federation and is an enhanced practitioner in Conversational Intelligence (CIQ). She focuses her coaching on senior executives and lawyers in law firms and corporations to enhance their professional impact, build high-performance skills and cultivate wellbeing and resilience. Prior to becoming a coach, Ellen spent 20+ years as an entertainment attorney at Disney, Showtime, Sony, Fox and Microsoft. She received her BA from Brandeis University and her JD from Emory University School of Law. To find out more: ebccoaching.com or linkedin.com/in/ebccoaching. Five Ways to Reconnect to Career Passion So how can you bring a sense of joy and purpose back to your career, in- crease your job satisfaction and recon- nect to what got you here in the first place? Here are five ways you might consider to reignite your passion. You can do these exercises by journaling, in a meditation practice or just in mindful contemplation when you are driving, in the shower, taking a walk- ing, or any time you can let your mind wander! 1. Think About Why You Wanted to become a Lawyer in the First Place. • What made being a lawyer an excit- ing for you? • What did you see as fulfilling and meaningful? • Does that still resonate with you? • Are you fulfilling your purpose/call- ing as a lawyer? 2. Connect with Gratitude and Focus on the Positive in Your Life. • Take some time to connect with ev- erything you have gained from being a lawyer, whether it’s intellectually, meaningfully/purposely, financially, self-identity-wise or otherwise. • Write down 10, 20 or even 50 rea- sons why you’re grateful for where you are today and for all that your career has given you. 3. Think About You Really Enjoy and/or Makes You Proud in Your Current or Recent Job. • Was there something significant or exciting that resonated with you, that gave you a sense of accomplish- ment, purpose or meaning? • What was it that you did that had a significant impact and why was this important to you either profession- ally or personally? • What do you love about your cur- rent job or from being a lawyer? 4. Determine what are your professional career goals in the Next One, Three and Five Years. Take some time to think about your immediate next steps and long-term goals. Maybe you want to be partner, start your own practice, go in-house, retire or do something completely dif- ferent either as a full-time career or a thriving side hustle. As an executive coach, I have consistently found that my clients feel more energized and focused when they have clear aspira- tions and goals. Once you have clarity on what you want from your career, create SMART ( S pecific / M easurable/ A chievable / R ealistic/ T ime-based) action plans as a personal contract—what do you want to commit to and by when? Keep this action plan as a guide as you make choices and decisions so that you are consistently moving towards what you really want. 5. Remember: Work Is Not Life and Life is not Work. Stress has a deleterious impact on your overall wellbeing, psychology, physiology and performance. Finding the time to do things that bring you joy outside of work will have a posi- tive impact on your ability to main- tain your mental health, sustain your wellbeing and build resiliency to re- bound from adversity. While it seems contradictory, taking time away for work to refresh and regroup will actu- ally make you more effective and ef- ficient. Things that you can do include hobbies, exercise, meditation or yoga, connecting with friends and family, social action and va- cations. Reconnecting with your passion is not only good for your practice, it’s good for your life! AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 15To the unsure, uneasy and undocu- mented immigrants in the Los Angeles area, attorney Alan Dia- mante wants you to know he feels your an- guish. And he’s doing something about it. A self-described immigrant rights activ- ist, Diamante fights to raise awareness of the laws for both the immigrants and those stand- ing on the sidelines. His passion started at a young age. “My father was a blue-collar immigrant from Argentina, and I was raised in the city of Los Angeles,” he says. “Going to public school with a heterogeneous group from all over the world has always made me appreciate the di- versity of race and culture.” His sensitivity towards immigrants grew in college, when he gained first-hand experi- ence of the foreigner’s plight while studying abroad in England. After learning his finan- cial aid had been terminated, he was given a choice: Give up his dream to study in a foreign land and go back to the States or stay and find work. The teenager chose the latter when a Co- lombian expat, one of the few Latinos in town, reassured him it would be easy to find employment. Diamante bought a bike for 15 quid and got to work. Written by Sarah Torres Photographed by Hugh Williams Attorney of the Month “I never forgot the humbling experience,” he says recalling one of the three jobs he took on. “After washing dishes for hours at the only Chinese restaurant in town, I would ride my bike home in the midnight drizzle drenched.” Describing this period of his life as “maturing, eye-opening and life-changing,” Diamante credits it as a factor in deciding later in life to become an immigration lawyer. “While I was in England, I was the ‘illegal immigrant,’ taking jobs that natives would not consider for the low pay,” he says. “I un- derstood at that point that people assume the risk of leaving their home country to work in a foreign land because there’s usually a great need or dream behind it.” Advocate and Activist Alan Diamante Alan DiamanteTaking to the Street Keeping those dreams in mind, Diamante took up the cause for immigrants as a law student at Loyola. It was the mid ’90s, and the state was grappling with California Proposition 187, which denied public services to undocu- mented immigrants. He joined the student La Raza group and protested in the streets. To his dismay, the proposition passed but was soon subject to an injunction. “I found it to be unconscionable that California would be supportive of a draconian program that would prevent children and parents, documented or not, from obtaining healthcare and education,” Diamante says. “I saw it as a form of state-sponsored terrorism. “I’m part of the Martin Luther King Jr. generation,” con- tinues Diamante, who was nearly a year old at the time of the civil rights leader’s assassination. “Growing up we honored MLK, who devoted his life preaching love over hate. With Prop 187, the State of California attempted to strip basic human services from a class of people. This was akin to the civil rights violations that I was taught to be against, whether I was affected by them directly or not.” “The new wave of immigration attorney- activists will be the vanguard of the defense of our Constitution and democratic rights.” AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 17Their Cause, His Cause With palatable outrage that the state would turn its back on children and sick individuals because of legal status, Diamante prompted himself further into the realm of protecting immigrants. Originally planning for a career in civil law, in 1997 an execu- tive director of a non-profit asked him to provide immigration legal services in Los Angeles. Immigration law and activism against immigrant oppression has proved to keep him busy ever since. Even though Prop 187 was ultimately deemed unconstitutional, millions of undocumented immigrants continue to fight for basic human rights while being vulnerable to “notario fraud,” the rampant practice of swindling im- migrants seeking immigration assis- tance. Diamante says that throughout the years 75% to 80% of his clientele have been victims of fraud. “The high demand for immigration services has motivated both unscru- pulous attorneys and fraudsters to steal from hardworking people who cannot navigate our legal system.” Diamante explains. “It’s a common scheme to take money by promising a green card or a work authorization document without explaining eligi- bility, risks and the likelihood of suc- cess.” He says that often an immigrant pays a lot more than originally ex- pected and ends up with a deporta- tion order. “This type of fraud shatters dreams and devastates families usually by de- porting the breadwinner,” says Dia- mante, who continues to fight im- migration consultant fraud and takes civil action against those who prey on immigrants. He also routinely repre- sents immigrants before the Depart- ment of Homeland Security, the De- partment of Justice and the Depart- ment of State. While there have been significant challenges for immigrants in his more than two decades of practice, Diaman- te says it’s drastically different now. “For the first time we have an executive branch that overtly aims to curb legal immigration and dis- regards the Fifth Amendment’s due process clause in an effort to increase deportation numbers,” he says, adding he believes the coun- try is in the middle of a human rights crisis. “Because of a president’s fear mongering, undocumented immi- grants and their U.S. citizen chil- dren live in terror,” he says. “For instance, it was clear even before the last presidential election that most overstays were people who traveled from Canada, includ- ing many of the 9/11 perpetra- tors, but immigration rhetoric has been fixated on migrants that enter through the southern border.” Unavoidable Activism With outrage over this phenom- enon, he says, he and many other immigration lawyers cannot avoid being activists. “There is a vigorous social movement in the United States to protect immigrants from the op- pressive and discriminatory en- forcement of the current immigra- tion laws,” he says. Diamante says he finds it hard to make sense of the current ad- ministration’s immigration policy without concluding that President Trump must be receiving bad ad- vice from racists who have had an anti-immigration agenda for de- cades. “Asylum-seeking migrants are being described as invaders, and this sounds like a justification to start a war,” he says. “More often than not, anti-immigrant mea- sures are supported by flawed sta- tistics and ‘alternative’ facts.” A new word, “Crimmigration,” he says, has been coined to de- scribe the criminal treatment of immigrants even though deporta- tion is a civil proceeding. “It can be said that actual crimi- nal defendants are provided more “While I was in England, I was the ‘illegal immigrant,’ taking jobs that natives would not consider for the low pay.”rights than immigrants in removal pro- ceedings. For example, there is no Sixth Amendment right to an attorney, and this has made it possible for immigration judges to proceed against unrepresented 2-year-olds.” And then there are the raids. Diamante notes that Immigration Customs En- forcement often commits violations of the Fourth Amendment, but only a small fraction of the cases can be fought in court because most result in expulsion without an opportunity to seek counsel. “When asked about whether they com- plied with federal regulations, often offi- cers will outright lie to you,” he says. “Be- fore, that was a big deal, and now it seems to be the norm.” In a further blow to due process, Dia- mante says the government has made it more complicated for people to get asy- lum, especially given the little time an asy- lum applicant is provided to gather docu- ments from abroad and prepare witnesses. Diamante, who provides deportation de- fense pro bono, says it’s “very challenging, but also very telling when the government makes it harder for people to get a defense.” Due Detriment Worsening the due process situ- ation, he says, is the recent indus- trialization of private prisons in re- mote locations, which complicates attorney and family efforts to visit detained migrants. “It is harder to represent someone if they’re housed out of state in the middle of the desert,” he explains. Diamante has been prolific in his assistance and vocal on his views. He participates in legal fairs and town halls to provide pro bono consulta- tions and seminars on immigrants’ rights. And he speaks publicly about his concerns for the fragility of the American legal system of checks and balances—the foundation of the democratic system. “The new wave of immigration attorney-activists will be the van- guard of the defense of our Con- stitution and democratic rights,” Diamante says. “As the executive branch expands immigration in- ternment camps and prepares for mass roundups, the legal fight is becoming more and more chal- lenging and meaningful. It is only by channeling the majority popu- lation’s opposition to a rogue ad- ministration that the rights of im- migrants will be secured.” Diamante says he draws upon the words of numerous heroes in his practice, yet one particular quote sticks in his mind as of late: Terrible things are happening outside. At any time of night and day, poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes …. Families are torn apart; men, women and children are separated. Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared. This famous quote by Anne Frank in 1943, he says, could be written about ICE raids today. “In an effort to banish a section of the population from the U.S., the government violates its own regulations, the Constitution, national laws and international agreements.” For the immigrants themselves, Diamante is launching and gener- ating funds and grants for a 501c3 non-profit called the Immigration Dream Center. Focused on help- ing immigrants realize the Amer- ican dream, it will build confi- dence and teach financial literacy, get immigrants active in their communities, and deliver voca- tional and educational opportu- nities by pairing immigrants and their children with mentors. “The IDC’s goal is to assist the immigrant’s success as a self-reli- ant, legal resident that contributes to community and the economy without the need of government aid,” he says. Diamante participates in legal fairs and town halls to provide pro bono consultations and seminars on immigrants’ rights.Next >