MPI Announces Arrival of Donald Kerwin as Vice President for Programs, Other Senior Staff Additions

WASHINGTON – Donald M. Kerwin Jr., longtime executive director of the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC), recently joined the Migration Policy Institute as vice president for programs, MPI President Demetrios Papademetriou announced today.

Kerwin, a leading expert working at the intersection of the immigration, immigrant integration and legal services fields, “will help strengthen MPI both in its analytical and management areas as the institute grows,” Papademetriou said. Kerwin spent nearly 15 years as executive director of CLINIC, a public-interest legal corporation that supports a national network of 173 charitable legal programs for immigrants. During his tenure, CLINIC coordinated the nation's largest political asylum, detainee services, immigration appeals and naturalization programs.

In his new role, Kerwin will be responsible for all MPI programs while continuing in his role as a frequent media commentator. He serves as an advisor to the American Bar Association's Commission on Immigration, on the Council on Foreign Relations' Immigration Task Force and the board of directors of Jesuit Refugee Services-USA, and as an associate fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center.

With Kerwin’s arrival, MPI Vice President and Director of Studies Michael Fix was promoted to senior vice president. Fix also serves as co-director of MPI’s National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy.

Papademetriou also announced that respected demographer Randy Capps has joined MPI as senior policy analyst. Capps comes to MPI from the Urban Institute, where he served as the institute’s lead immigration researcher for the past three years. At MPI, his research will focus on immigrants in the U.S. labor force; education of immigrants’ children; immigrant integration strategies; and the impacts of immigration enforcement on families and communities, among other topics.

And earlier this year, noted immigration and Latino issues analyst Roberto Suro joined MPI as a senior non-resident scholar and senior adviser to Papademetriou. Suro, who is on the journalism faculty of the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication, was founding director of the Pew Hispanic Center, a research group established with support from the Pew Charitable Trusts.

“We are delighted at the depth of experience that Don, Randy and Roberto bring to the Migration Policy Institute,” Papademetriou said. “Each is a leader in his field of expertise, and their arrival speaks to our determination to further grow MPI’s research and expertise at a time when immigration matters are of ever greater importance in the United States and around the world.”