Karen Pedraza is an Immigrants’ Rights Attorney for the Sacramento Valley/Central California Office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-SVCC). In this position, she provides representation to community members in their immigration cases. As a daughter of Mexican immigrants, Karen believes that migration is a human right.
Karen received her Bachelor of Arts in History from Saint Mary’s College of California and her J.D. from UC Davis School of Law. She studied abroad at La Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogota where she studied Colombian history and perfected her Spanish. Prior to joining CAIR, Karen was a staff attorney at a Sacramento nonprofit where she represented detained and non-detained immigrants before the Executive Office of Immigration Review in Sacramento, San Francisco, and Van Nuys. She also represented children at USCIS and EOIR.
As a law student in the UC Davis Immigration Law Clinic, Karen enforced children’s rights under the Flores Settlement Agreement and Lucas R. v. Azar. As one of the few and fluent Spanish speakers, she interviewed children regarding living conditions, access to legal services, and medical conditions in four detention centers. Karen interned with the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California and with the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation.
Karen frequently provides free legal consultations in times of crisis to the immigrant community. In her free time, Karen enjoys dancing Mexican Ballet Folklorico, going on bike rides with her partner, and walking her dog Osito.
