UC Berkeley Names Shahpour Matloob as In-House Immigration Staff Attorney

(BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA) UC Berkeley has hired its first in-house immigration staff attorney, appointing Shahpour “Shawn” Matloob to provide legal advice and court representation to campus community members who are legal permanent residents. Matloob began work in mid-September 2025, marking the first time the campus has had a dedicated in-house lawyer focused on immigration services for green card holders among its students, staff, faculty, and non-faculty academic appointees.

The university’s move creates a direct point of contact on campus for people navigating immigration issues as legal permanent residents, commonly known as green card holders. The role is tightly defined: Matloob’s remit is to serve UC Berkeley students, staff, faculty, and non-faculty academic appointees who are legal permanent residents, offering both day-to-day legal guidance and representation in court when needed. UC Berkeley described the hire as part of a broader effort to remove barriers for UC students and staff by providing direct immigration legal support.

Matloob’s appointment is notable within the University of California system because it is the first time UC Berkeley has placed an immigration staff attorney in-house rather than referring all matters out to systemwide resources. He works with the UC Immigrant Legal Services Center, which is based at UC Davis School of Law and serves multiple UC campuses. While that center continues to support campuses across the system, UC Berkeley’s decision to base an attorney on campus gives the Berkeley community a clearly identified practitioner dedicated to legal permanent resident matters within the university environment.

The new hire also reflects a precise focus on a defined population. According to the university’s announcement, Matloob’s role is specifically tailored to legal permanent residents, not to other immigration categories. That scope is explicit: students, staff, faculty, and non-faculty academic appointees who hold green cards are eligible for the in-house service. The emphasis on both advice and court representation indicates the campus expects to handle matters that may include interactions with federal agencies or proceedings that require an attorney to appear, but the university has not released examples of individual cases or typical issues at this stage.

Matloob arrives with a set of credentials that position him as a subject-matter specialist in complex federal immigration practice. He is a certified Immigration & Nationality Law Specialist by the State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization, a credential that recognizes attorneys who meet rigorous experience, education, and examination standards in their fields. He maintains a private practice, Matloob Law Office, in Berkeley, which anchors his work within the local legal community. In addition to his certification and private practice, he serves on the AILA USCIS Operations Committee, sits on the AILA NorCal Advisory Council as San Francisco USCIS Co-Liaison, and is a member of the Iranian American Bar Association Northern California Chapter’s Advisory Board. Those roles connect him to national and regional professional networks that regularly interface with federal immigration agencies and local bar associations.

The UC Immigrant Legal Services Center, with which Matloob will work, is housed at UC Davis School of Law and supports multiple UC campuses. The center’s structure enables the university system to share expertise across locations. UC Berkeley’s addition of an in-house immigration staff attorney makes the Berkeley campus an outlier within that model by embedding a specialist on site for the first time. The campus characterized the post as a way to provide direct immigration legal support and remove barriers for its community, aligning with UC-wide efforts to expand access to legal services for university affiliates.

For UC Berkeley, the timeline is clear. The university said Matloob began providing legal advice and court representation to eligible community members in mid-September 2025. The announcement did not include a numerical target for caseload or a projected number of people served. It did, however, specify that the service is for legal permanent residents, also referred to as green card holders. More information on legal permanent residency is available from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services green card resource, the federal agency’s official guide.

In practice, the distinction between legal permanent residents and other immigration categories matters because the legal questions, pathways, and obligations can differ. UC Berkeley’s decision to define the service around green card holders sets expectations for who can seek help from the new in-house resource. The announcement did not broaden the remit to include other groups, and it did not list additional eligibility criteria beyond university affiliation and legal permanent resident status. That specificity underscores how the campus is tailoring its new legal service to a particular set of needs within its community.

The hiring of an immigration staff attorney also suggests the university expects to handle matters that can escalate to representation in court. While the announcement highlighted both advice and representation as core functions, it did not outline the kinds of proceedings the office will take on or the forums in which they might occur. It also did not describe referral pathways for issues outside the scope of legal permanent residents. Those details may emerge as the office begins handling requests and communicating with the campus about the parameters of its services.

Matloob’s background indicates ongoing engagement with national and regional immigration practice. Serving on the AILA USCIS Operations Committee connects him to discussions about how the federal agency implements policies and manages filings. His role on the AILA NorCal Advisory Council as San Francisco USCIS Co-Liaison places him at an intersection between the private bar and local agency operations in the Bay Area. Participation on the Iranian American Bar Association Northern California Chapter’s Advisory Board situates him within a community-focused legal network. Together with his State Bar certification and his Berkeley private practice, those roles give UC Berkeley access to an attorney grounded in both specialized law and local practice.

UC Berkeley’s collaboration with the UC Immigrant Legal Services Center remains part of the picture. The center’s base at UC Davis School of Law and its systemwide mission have allowed UC campuses to draw from shared resources. By stationing an immigration staff attorney at Berkeley, the campus is complementing that systemwide model with a dedicated on-site presence focused on legal permanent residents. The university did not indicate changes to services for other immigration categories or whether additional in-house roles might follow.

The campus framed the hire as the first time a UC Berkeley office has hosted an in-house staff attorney dedicated to immigration legal services for green card holders. That historical first highlights how the university is adapting its legal services infrastructure. It also sets a baseline against which future developments can be measured, whether UC Berkeley later expands the scope of the attorney’s work or other UC campuses consider similar in-house appointments.

As of October 30, 2025, no individual case examples, personal stories, or outcome data were included in the university’s materials, and there were no direct quotes from Matloob or from affected students, staff, or faculty. The announcement centered on his appointment, his role, and his credentials. That leaves the specifics of day-to-day operations—such as intake processes, expected timelines for consultations, and how court representation will be prioritized—to be clarified as the office becomes established.

The addition of an immigration staff attorney gives UC Berkeley a recognizable point person for a defined group of community members. For a large campus that includes undergraduate and graduate students, academic appointees, staff in a wide range of roles, and faculty across departments, the creation of a clear channel for immigration-related legal help signals that the university is building capacity in a focused way. Even without case data or personal testimonies at launch, the decision to appoint an in-house attorney with specialized certification and active roles in professional organizations indicates an institutional investment aimed at delivering consistent legal support within the bounds the university has set.

For Shahpour “Shawn” Matloob, the appointment aligns a specialized practice with a campus community that sought a dedicated resource for legal permanent residents. For UC Berkeley, it marks a structural change in how immigration services are delivered on campus. And for the larger UC network, it adds a new chapter to the system’s approach to legal support, pairing the UC Immigrant Legal Services Center’s systemwide mission with Berkeley’s first-ever on-site immigration staff attorney focused on the university’s legal permanent resident population.