Today we’d like to introduce you to Deborah Kimbuta.
Deborah, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I’ve always had some sort of love for the law and for helping people within my community, no matter what that community was. I’ve always had a belief that who I am and who I become is mainly so I can pour into those who come after me. As a teenager, I wasn’t the most behaved in school and that, unfortunately, landed me in Teen Court. I remember having to serve in “jury duty” and watching the teen advocates argue for their “clients” and I throughly enjoyed it! As school progressed, I began to take interest in Criminal Justice in regards to juvenile, that turned to Criminal law, which molded into International business, then flourished into international research, Immigration law, and contract drafting and review.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It was absolutely not a smooth road, and I don’t think I’d appreciate it as much if it were. Law school was a trying time that truly birthed a different side to me. After graduating and passing the bar, it felt like I was coming up for air and didn’t know what to do with this newfound freedom, The international community is not easy to break into, especially being a young African woman. I went to conferences and summit meetings where world leaders and high-class officials would either talk to me like a child or tell me something that would make the fact that I am a woman the topic of conversation. That was and has been my fuel.
When I graduated and passed the bar I did it because I knew the world that I was entering would be male-dominated and that if they did try to undermine me, they would have to do it using the titles “esquire” or attorney. I had to, and am still working on building a tough skin because I am my product, so I have no choice but to believe in myself despite all odds. The bigger picture had to remain in my mind that helping my community and building at all levels is the end goal. My clients are more than just clients to me. They are lives that I am doing my best to better through my help so that they can, in turn, better the world.
We’d love to hear more about your work.
The big goal is to serve as a liaison in consulting on policies and laws targeted towards developing countries. Making sure that the voices of the population of those countries is being heard, and that is the main part of my legal research.I have worked in South Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo as well as interned at the United Nations and in all those experiences I have learned to always listen to the voice of the population. That being said, outside of my legal research, I decided to take on Immigration. I believe that immigration has been turned into such a political campaign that we are forgetting that these are actually lives and families at stake. I want to be able to not only help but do so at an affordable rate while providing them with all the information necessary to move forward.
There is so much miscommunication about readily available information out there and I feel it is my duty to share it. It took 12 years for my mother to get us hour citizenship, not for lack of trying, but because she had a couple of faulty attorneys, had a language barrier and was misinformed. My job now is to make sure that does not happen to others. I have started a new Legal Wisdom Wednesday platform where every Wednesday, I share a legal tip mainly on immigration to be able to share information.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
If I had to start over, and I knew that I wanted to deal with international law, I would’ve focused early on with volunteering within the international community and invested building more knowledge in that field. However, there’s nothing I regret, my road and journey was mine for a reason.
Contact Info:
- Phone: 6822332252
- Email: Dkimbuta.esq@gmail.com
- Instagram: @Kimbutaesq
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