Valentina De Fex became the ACLU of Utah's new Staff Attorney in March 2021. She originally joined the affiliate in April 2020 as our first Immigrants’ Rights Legal Fellow and fifteenth full-time employee.

In her new position, Valentina will manage the ACLU of Utah's legal docket and engagement across a wide range of civil rights and civil liberties issues. As a Legal Fellow, her work has focused on the civil rights and liberties as they affect immigrant communities, ensuring that immigrants' rights are both recognized and protected. Working on topics ranging from immigration detention to vaccine distribution to combatting the effects of the English-Only law, she has identified and resolved legal and policy barriers and re-shaped government practices to better service immigrant communities in Utah. Prior to joining the ACLU of Utah, Valentina was an immigration attorney for a non-profit in Portland, OR. As a first-generation immigrant, Valentina's experiences provided her with first-hand insight into the systemic barriers that many immigrants face on a daily basis. Her personal experience and the cruel realities of the immigration system that she's witnessed have led her down a path devoted to the defense of Immigrants' constitutional rights and civil liberties.

Valentina earned her undergraduate degree at the University of Pennsylvania. She obtained her J.D. from Boston College Law School where she was awarded the Susan Grant Desmarais Award for Public Service Achievement and Leadership and named a Clough Center for Constitutional Democracy Law Fellow. In law school, Valentina worked as a student attorney at the Boston College Legal Services LAB Immigration Clinic, representing individuals in immigration proceedings and before Federal District Court and the First Circuit Court of Appeals. She also participated in the Ninth Circuit Appellate Project where she co-briefed and co-argued an immigration case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Valentina was also involved with BC's Latin America Law Student Association, participating in the organization of the 2016 National Latino/a Law Student Association Conference, and BC's Immigration Law Group, where she led a student group that successfully secured the release of multiple individuals from ICE custody.