ENGLEWOOD, N.J. — Englewood Mayor Michael Wildes is adding Columbia Law School to his academic resume this fall, where the veteran immigration attorney and public servant will teach a course on business immigration, visas, workforce and compliance law.
Wildes will teach at both Columbia and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law this semester. He has served as an adjunct professor at Cardozo for the past 15 years.
A nationally recognized immigration attorney, Wildes has spent nearly four decades practicing at the intersection of immigration law, government and public service. He is managing partner of Wildes & Weinberg, P.C., the immigration law firm founded by his father, Leon Wildes, in 1960.
His father became nationally known for representing former Beatle John Lennon and Yoko Ono Lennon in their immigration battle, a case that helped shape modern U.S. immigration law.
Wildes earned his law degree from Cardozo in 1989. He has often shared that he met his wife while attending one of his father's classes there. His father taught at Cardozo for 33 years, and Wildes later had the opportunity to teach two of his own four children at the school. His son Josh has since joined the family firm.
Over his career, Wildes has represented Fortune 500 executives, celebrities, athletes, Nobel Prize winners and heads of state, along with thousands of immigrants seeking to build new lives in the United States. His clients have included Yoko Ono Lennon, Pelé, Melania Trump, Mike Tyson, Dolly Parton, Lionel Richie and Millie Bobby Brown, among others.
Wildes previously served as a federal prosecutor with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Brooklyn from 1989 to 1993. He later testified before Congress on anti-terrorism immigration legislation and has appeared frequently as a legal analyst on national television.
He also served for 20 years on the District Appeals Board of the Selective Service System after being appointed by President Ronald Reagan.
Wildes currently serves as immigration counsel to Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and Yeshiva University and is in his fifth term as mayor of Englewood.
He is also the author of two books published by the American Bar Association, including Safe Haven in America: Battles to Open the Golden Door. His newest book, From Origin to Opportunity: Unlocking U.S. Immigration Law, is scheduled for release this fall.
At Columbia, Wildes said he will bring students a perspective shaped by decades of handling complex immigration matters and working directly with clients whose lives are often affected by the laws they study.
For Wildes, the Columbia appointment adds another chapter to a career that has taken him from the federal courtroom to City Hall and now into one of the country's most prestigious law schools.
