Leon Wildes

Leon Wildes earned his undergraduate degree from Yeshiva University and his J.D. and LL.M. from the New York University School of Law before opening his own immigration practice in 1960. Over the following decades he built Wildes & Weinberg into one of the nation's premier immigration boutiques and served as National President of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

Between 1972 and 1976 he represented John Lennon and Yoko Ono against the Nixon administration's effort to deport them — and, in the course of that defense, uncovered the government's confidential “nonpriority” program, the foundation of what is now understood as prosecutorial discretion. The case is widely regarded as the most influential deportation matter in United States history.

He taught immigration law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law for more than thirty-three years, mentoring a generation of attorneys, and authored “John Lennon vs. The U.S.A.” His son Michael leads the firm today; his grandson Joshua joined in 2021.