General Attorney (Regulatory Affairs)

Join the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA), as Counsel for the Regulatory Affairs Unit (RAU), to leverage your experience to serve your country. The individual selected will collaborate within a dynamic team of economists, regulatory analysts, attorneys, and other stakeholders on high-profile agency matters in a fast-paced environment.

Applicants must be a graduate of an accredited law school with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) or LLM degree. Please see Required Documents for more information.

A student loan repayment incentive may be available; if such an incentive is available and is authorized, a service agreement will be required.

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 laws 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 (BIA), with special emphasis on cases involving criminal aliens, human rights violators, and aliens who threaten our national security.

Within EG&L, the RAU consists of regulatory attorneys, analysts, and economists. RAU attorneys serve as regulatory counsel and play a significant role in the development and promulgation of regulatory actions relating to a variety of law enforcement authorities and functions, including immigration arrest, detention, and processing as well as oversight of the Student and Exchange Visitor Program. RAU personnel review and draft regulations, policy directives, and other materials for DHS, ICE, and OPLA Senior Leadership. The RAU frequently engages with policymakers, ICE operational clients, the DHS Office of the General Counsel Headquarters, and DHS components to develop rules that further DHS's and ICE's enforcement objectives and strategic initiatives.

The selected attorney(s) will be expected to:

• Draft and interpret regulations, as well as advise clients on statutory authority for rulemaking and application of the Administrative Procedure Act, the Paperwork Reduction Act, the Regulatory Flexibility Act, and related authorities.
• Assist with crafting legally supportable policies to address the needs of agency operational components.
• Routinely provide timely legal opinions to ICE officers and agents, EG&L managers, and leadership within OPLA, ICE, and the DHS Office of the General Counsel Headquarters; and
• Provide litigation support to the Department of Justice and review documents for responsiveness and privilege as part of discovery in civil litigation as necessary.

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.

Bar Membership: You must be an active member in good standing of the bar of a state, territory of the United States, the District of Columbia, or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Current or Former Political Appointees: The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) must authorize employment offers made to current or former political appointees. If you are currently, or have been within the last 5 years, a political Schedule A, Schedule C, Non-career SES or Presidential Appointee employee in the Executive Branch, you must disclose this information to the Human Resources Office.

The Department of Homeland Security encourages persons with disabilities to apply, to include persons with intellectual, severe physical or psychiatric disabilities, as defined by 5 C.F.R. § 213.3102(u), and/or Disabled Veterans with a compensable service-connected disability of 30 percent or more as defined by 5 C.F.R. § 315.707. Veterans, Peace Corps/VISTA volunteers, and persons with disabilities possess a wealth of unique talents, experiences, and competencies that can be invaluable to the DHS mission. If you are a member of one of these groups, you may not have to compete with the public for federal jobs.