General Attorney (Ethics)

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA) is seeking an energetic and dedicated attorney to join the Ethics Law Division's Washington, D.C. location. One or more positions may be filled using this vacancy announcement. 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. An ICE ethics attorney will work as a member of a collaborative team in the Ethics Law Division within EG&L to provide training and guidance on the Executive Branch Standards of Conduct program for government employees and on attorney professional responsibility matters. The responsibilities of the position will consist primarily of providing counsel to ICE employees at all grade levels to include senior officials, including providing guidance and issuing advisory opinions in response to written and verbal requests for advice; reviewing public and confidential financial disclosure reports filed by covered management officials and researching the investments and positions held to identify and assess potential conflicts of interest; assisting with the implementation of agency ethics rules, instructions, and policies; and providing group training to ICE program offices on government ethics. The position may also involve providing attorney professional responsibility advice and training to OPLA attorneys in addition to litigation before the Office of the Chief Administrative Hearing Officer (OCAHO) in pursuit of private bar attorneys and other document preparers engaged in fraud; as well as addressing fraud and other professional misconduct through review and referral of internal reports of potential private bar misconduct to state and/or federal disciplinary agencies. Selected attorneys will be provided requisite training and will then be given significant responsibilities and will be expected to craft persuasive, legally supportable positions to address the needs of agency operational components. Selected attorneys will be expected to routinely provide timely legal opinions to ICE officers and agents, division management, and leadership within OPLA, ICE, and the DHS Office of the General Counsel Headquarters. OPLA will ensure that applicants with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodations when appropriate. If reasonable accommodation is required for any part of the application process, please contact the OPLA representative listed on this announcement. Qualification requirements must be met by the closing date of this announcement. Qualification claims will be subject to verification. 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 and agency personnel, including law enforcement officers, policymakers, attorneys, and agency senior leadership, and must be able to tailor communications to particular audiences. 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. 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.