Research & Education
November 2025: UFA member Brandon Logan publishes Reclaiming Foster Care: An America First Vision for Protecting Children and Strengthening Families.
September 2024: UFA member Josh Gupta-Kagan publishes (De)Funding Family Separations, a review of federal financial incentive structures in child welfare with recommendations on how to structure them to support keeping families together.
November 2023: UFA member Richard Wexler is quoted on NPR Morning Edition: ‘Deluged’ child welfare systems struggle to protect kids amid calls for reform.
September 2023: Josh Gupta-Kagan on hidden foster care in the Missouri Independent: Missouri must reduce family separations, not only formal foster care numbers.
August 2023: EPPiC Broadcast: “Reforming the Texas Foster Care System” with UFA members Michael Ramey and Andrew Brown.
August 2023: National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, led by UFA member Richard Wexler, releases Colorado Trails, a report that details the CO Department of Human Service’s harms to children.
July 2023: UFA member Michael Ramey is interviewed on The Imprint Weekly Podcast on empowering parents and protecting children.
August 2022: EPPiC Broadcast: “Representing Parents in Family Court” with UFA members Michael Ramey and Kathleen Creamer.
April 2022: UFA members quoted in BuzzFeed News: “It’s Like A Leech On Me:” Child Abuse Registries Punish Unsuspecting Parents Of Color.
Policy Advocacy:
January 2026: UFA members are instrumental in drafting and publishing an American Legislative Exchange Council model policy to protect due process for families facing potential separation.
June 2025: UFA member Richard Wexler publishes an op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal: It’s Wrong to Assume Removing Children from Homes is Always in Their Best Interest.
March 2025: UFA member Johana Scot is instrumental in proposing legislation in Texas that would require child welfare agencies to undertake “active efforts”—a higher legal standard—before removing children from their homes, and would raise the burden of proof for terminating parental rights.
February 2025: UFA member Chris Gottlieb is co-counsel on a landmark case ruling that New York City’s practice of requiring child welfare investigations of parents who are victims of domestic violence is illegal.
July 2024: The New York Times reports on a case that UFA member Chris Gottlieb’s Family Defense Clinic at NYU is co-counsel on, which received bipartisan support.
March 2024: UFA member Richard Wexler’s op-ed about Massachusetts’ child welfare system is published in the Commonwealth Beacon.
February 2024: UFA member Chris Gottlieb’s Family Defense Clinic at NYU is instrumental in filing a class action lawsuit challenging illegal searches, highlighted in the New York Times and The Imprint.
February 2024: UFA member Richard Wexler publishes op-eds in the Lexington Herald Leader and the Rhode Island Current.
Sept 2023: New legislation (SB 614) restricts hidden foster care in Texas, providing parents with notice of their right to counsel prior to voluntary placements, limiting the time children can be in such placements, and requiring the Department of Family and Protective Services to publish data on hidden foster care.
August 2023: The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and Temple University Beasley School of Law collaborate with Community Legal Services of Philadelphia on a report, Advocating Abolition of PA ChildLine Registry.
July 2023: UFA joins a national coalition in Washington, D.C. to raise awareness about hidden foster care in a Congressional briefing, in partnership with the Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth.
July 2023: UFA’s work advocating for a Family Miranda law in Texas is highlighted by ProPublica.