After losing his mother and struggling to rebuild his life alone, a teenage immigrant found hope through the Immigrant Legal Defense Center.
He arrived in the United States alone, worked construction jobs to survive and carried the grief of losing his mother before counseling and legal support helped him rebuild his life. Now, he’s obtained legal status, secured a better paying job and welcomed a daughter, whom he named in honor of his mother.
His story was one of many shared Wednesday evening during the Immigrant Legal Defense Center’s eighth annual “A Toast to Justice: Stories of Hope” fundraiser. To protect client confidentiality, actors portrayed stories before nearly 200 guests gathered at Cabrillo Pavilion.
As immigration enforcement intensifies across the Central Coast, the nonprofit is expanding its services, including remote mental health counseling for people being held in immigration detention.
Founded in 2018, the Immigrant Legal Defense Center provides free deportation defense, immigration legal representation, case management and mental health services to low income immigrants across Santa Barbara, Ventura and San Luis Obispo counties. The organization currently represents more than 500 clients with a staff of eight attorneys, alongside case managers and therapists.
“Despite facing so many challenges, we’re still winning, and we’re still restoring freedom for our clients,” Executive Director Julissa Peña said. “That’s not to say that things haven’t gotten more difficult, but it is still possible.”
Peña said the organization recently expanded its services to include remote counseling for people held in immigration detention, allowing clients to receive therapy while awaiting the outcome of their cases.
“Those moments of hopelessness… many of them are already having suicidal ideation,” Peña said. “We found it essential to integrate mental health services because of the trauma we saw our clients experience.”
The confidential video sessions are coordinated through clients’ attorneys, who arrange the meetings before stepping away so therapists and case managers can speak privately with detainees.
Peña said the counseling program was created because immigration attorneys often have to ask clients to repeatedly recount traumatic experiences while building asylum and deportation defense cases.
“The legal process itself exacerbates the trauma,” Peña said. “The legal team and the mental health team need each other. Our intention is to provide holistic social legal services.”
Throughout the evening, guests listened quietly as actors recounted the anonymous stories of clients who fled violence, family separation and political persecution before rebuilding their lives with help from the organization. The room responded with sustained applause after each story, reinforcing the event’s theme of hope.
Guest participate in the Immigrant Legal Defense Center’s annual fundraiser Wednesday at Cabrillo Pavilion (Kaitlin Sweeney / Santa Barbara News-Press)
Board member Lisa Rothstein, who serves on the fundraising committee, said organizers intentionally centered this year’s event on resilience amid heightened immigration enforcement.
“We really wanted to focus on what ILDC is doing to change that narrative,” Rothstein said. “Yes, we are in a very difficult time, but there are people that are working really hard to address those problems, and they need support.”
Rothstein said attendance has nearly doubled since last years fundraiser, growing to about 200 attendees.
“This is to be an antidote to giving up,” she said. “To just show that there is stuff happening. There are successes happening.”
Peña said events like Wednesday’s fundraiser serve as a reminder that no one has to face those challenges alone.
“It’s moments like this when you see the power that community truly has,” Peña said. “And it’s the power of community and togetherness that’s going to help us overcome these times.”
