The fourth episode of the Working Towards Nine podcast is a conversation between ACLU Michigan Legal Director Dan Korobkin and attorney Abril Valdes Siewart. Listen to Korokbkin provide an update on the most recent litigation, constitutional amendments, policy, and the current legal priorities of the ACLU Michigan.
Dan Korobkin became legal director of the ACLU of Michigan in 2019. He has been an ACLU of Michigan attorney since 2008 and served as deputy legal director for five years. His civil rights advocacy and leadership span various issues, from criminal law reform to LGBTQ rights to freedom of speech and religion.
Dan has led the ACLU’s fight to end Michigan’s shameful practice of sentencing children to life in prison without the possibility of parole, having litigated the pathbreaking Hill v. Snyder class action lawsuit from 2010 until a settlement was reached in 2020. In 2019, he helped spearhead the ACLU of Michigan’s bail reform lawsuit in Detroit, a class action challenging the bail practices in the 36th District Court. In 2021, he argued and won Johnson v. Vanderkooi, a case in the Michigan Supreme Court establishing a Fourth Amendment right not to be stopped and fingerprinted by the police on the side of the road.
In addition to his work on criminal law reform, Dan has been recognized as a pioneer in protecting the rights of medical marijuana patients, having argued and won Ter Beek v. City of Wyoming in the Michigan Supreme Court in 2014. He also represents a class of schoolchildren seeking special education services in the wake of the Flint Water Crisis, and he was on the legal team representing Aimee Stephens, a transgender woman whose employment discrimination case led to a historic victory in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2020. In 2021, Dan was recognized as Lawyer of the Year by Michigan Lawyers Weekly.
Korobkin has a law degree from Yale Law School and a bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College. Before working at the ACLU, Korobkin served as a law clerk to U.S. District Judge Myron H. Thompson in Montgomery, Alabama, and to Judge Robert D. Sack on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He grew up in Ann Arbor.
Abril Valdes Siewert has dedicated her career to helping vulnerable communities. She is the owner and principal attorney of Valdes Law, PLLC. Most recently, Ms. Siewert worked under immigration guru Robert Birach as a Senior Associate Attorney. She served as the Immigrant Rights Attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Michigan, where she co-authored the Michigan Crimmigration resource guide. She was also a Staff Attorney for Honigman’s immigration group and has worked for Lakeshore Legal Aid’s Center for Advocacy Law Line, guiding in pro per clients through claims in various district courts. Ms. Siewert is licensed in the state of Michigan and California.
Ms. Siewert received her J.D. from the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law and her B.A. in English from California State University Los Angeles. She is a Governor appointed Commissioner for the Hispanic/Latino Commission of Michigan, Vice-Chair for the State Bar of Michigan’s Immigration Law Section, co-chair of the Diversity & Inclusion committee for the Women Lawyers Association of Michigan, and Board of Director for the Hispanic Bar Association.
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