Honorary Consul of Guatemala
in West Palm Beach, Florida

Aileen Josephs, Honorary Consul of Guatemala in West Palm Beach, Florida.

Aileen Josephs has worked for over eighteen years in Palm Beach County as an attorney focusing primarily on immigration law.  During these years, she has represented thousands of Guatemalan nationals and has defended the civil and human rights of many of them.

Born in Mexico City, Mexico, from a Venezuelan mother and an U.S. born father whose parents escaped Poland before the Holocaust, Aileen had the privilege of attending Brandeis University, in Waltham, Massachusetts where her interest in immigration policy developed working with Salvadorian refugees in Waltham, MA.   She writes her thesis under the mentoring of renowned Prof. Lawrence Fuchs, titled: “The need for a statutory type of safe-haven for Nationals escaping generalized conditions of civil strife”, studying the case of Salvadorian immigrants to the United States in the 1980’s.    With this thesis, Attorney Josephs receives the Martin Lester Award in Legal Studies from Brandeis University and graduates Cum laude with High Honors in 1986 from this prestigious University majoring in Sociology, Latin American Studies and legal studies.

Aileen thereafter graduates from Boston College Law School in 1990 and since then works primarily in the field of immigration law. Ms. Josephs began her career in New York City, working for the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) and after moving to Palm Beach County in 1992 with her husband began working for Florida Rural Legal Services, in Lake Worth, Florida.  It is with Florida Rural Legal Services that Attorney Josephs began working with the great number of Guatemalan nationals that began arriving to this County in the l980’s.