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Hon. Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux on her Public Interest and Judicial Career, UC Irvine Days and Advice on How to Be a Really Great Litigator

Dean Austen Parrish interviews The Honorable Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux, United States Bankruptcy Judge for the Central District of California, Riverside Division, about her public interest and judicial career, her experience as an undergraduate at UC Irvine, and her pro tips for students applying for judicial clerkships. 

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Featuring:

• 

  Austen Parrish

  Dean and Chancellor’s Professor of Law
  University of California, Irvine School of Law
  
  

  Dean Parrish is a recognized expert in transnational law, civil procedure, constitutional law, and federal courts. He has written extensively on these topics, publishing numerous scholarly articles and co-authoring three books. His teaching spans a wide array of subjects, including Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Federal Courts, Transnational Law, International Environmental Law, and Public International Law. A prominent leader in legal education, he currently serves as president-elect of the Association of American Law Schools, sits on the board of the AccessLex Institute, and is co-editor of the Journal of Legal Education. He is also an elected member of the American Law Institute and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation.

• 

  The Honorable Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux

  United States Bankruptcy Judge for the Central District of California, Riverside Division.

  Prior to her appointment as United States Bankruptcy Judge, The Honorable Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux managed Public Counsel’s Debtor Assistance Project and was an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School. She was also an elected member of the 9th Circuit Conference Executive Committee and an Executive Board Member of California Lawyers Association Business Law Section. She has written numerous articles on bankruptcy issues, and she is a frequent speaker on bankruptcy and bankruptcy related issues. She is a graduate of UCLA School of Law, where she received her J.D and was the managing editor of the UCLA Journal of Law & Technology.

   

Podcast Transcript

Intro 0:04
Welcome to UCI Law talks from the University of California, Irvine School of Law. For all our latest news, follow UCI Law on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn.

Austen Parrish 0:22
Thank you for joining us. My name Austen Parrish. I'm the Dean and Chancellor's Professor at the University of California Irvine School of Law. This is UCI Law Talks, the podcast where you learn more about the amazing Anteater community that is UC Irvine School of Law, and hear from leaders and lawyers of Southern California

Today, Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux, an Anteater in Law who's joining us to talk about her career, her time on the bench, public interest law, bankruptcy law, and her time at UC Irvine. Judge Reyes Bordeaux was appointed to serve as bankruptcy judge for the Central District of California in Riverside in January of 2022.

She is the first Latina bankruptcy judge on the Court. Before her appointment, she was a supervising senior staff attorney with public counsel's debtor Assistance Project, where she managed the nation's largest bankruptcy pro bono project. She's practiced bankruptcy law for over 22 years. In addition to Public Counsel, worked at the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. During her career, she's been active in many ways with the community. She served as an appointed Member of the Ninth Circuit judicial conference's executive committee and executive board member of the California lawyers Association's Business Law Section, as a board member of the Latina lawyers Bar Association and as an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School. She has received several awards recognizing her work and scholarship and bankruptcy law, including the president emeritus Henry J Sommer Scholarship Award and the Thomas B Donovan public Excellence Award. Judge, Reyes perdo is a graduate of UCLA School of Law, where she received her J.D. and here at UC Irvine, where she received her Bachelor's in political science from the School of Humanities. Judge, thank you so much for joining the podcast. Fabulous to have you with us. Maybe I can start off by just talking about your time at UCI Irvine. How did you choose UC Irvine? How did you decide to get a degree in political science and humanities, and maybe are there things that you particularly remember about that time that left a mark on you?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 2:15
I loved my time at UCI. I selected it because it was one of the colleges that would be close enough to home that I could go home. I had this grand notion as a young 17-18, year old, that I was going to go away. And as the day came closer, I ran into my high school counseling. You didn't apply to the UCs. You need to come to my office and apply to the UCs. And so I applied. And one of the schools I applied to was UCI. When I visited the campus, it was a small enough campus where I felt that it would be a great place to go to school. I met some of the professors, and I chose political science because I knew I always wanted to be interested. I was always interested in law. The regular standard major was political science, humanities. I actually received it by accident. I think I marked something, and then I ended up in humanities. Loved it, but that wasn't a choice that was very thoughtful. As far as things that I remember at UCI, I think for me, I was so pleased with the professors that I got to work with and got to know at UCI, some of which I still keep in contact with, and the opportunities they made available, I was impressed with how seriously they took their commitment to not only teach, but to mentor. I had the opportunity to work witha a professor on his cutting edge research on political cartoons and the impact on the public. For all your listeners, this is before social media newspapers were a big thing that were studied. And then number two, I got to know the Dean of the School of Social Sciences, and I was selected to go to the Naval Academy to represent UCI, where I presented a paper on the passage of NAFTA and the changing global markets. And so it was a really wonderful experience. Like I said, I still keep in contact, and I also made many great friends. One of my best friends I met my first weekend at UCI, and we're still friends today.

Austen Parrish 4:03
Oh, wow, there's some fabulous colleagues in the School of Humanities and the School of Social Science. It's really an amazing undergraduate experience. What made you decide to go to law school?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 4:12
It actually began when I was five years old. My mother escaped an abusive relationship marriage, and at five years old, she told me a story about a public interest attorney let her navigate escaping the abuse of the relationship, getting the mechanisms, whether it be through law enforcement and all of that. And she spoke so highly of this legal aid attorney many years ago, at five years old, that at five years old, I said, that's what I want to do. I want to be that person. And I just looked up to my mom. She was just such an extraordinary person, and so when she told me that story, I'm like, That's it. That's what I'm going to do.

Austen Parrish 4:49
You've had an just an amazing career in public service, both on public interest and now on the bench. Is that what drew you to starting at places like Public Counsel and Legal Aid of Los Angeles,maybe, you could talk a little bit about that work.

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 5:01
Absolutely, working at Public Counsel, I would say, was one of the most meaningful experiences of my career. Before joining the bench, it enabled me to see firsthand the obstacles that an array of challenges that people trying to access our courts encounter, both just on an economic barriers of hiring an attorney and not being able to have and also the importance of what role we can play to make the courts more accessible and fair to people appearing before them. So Public Counsel was really pivotal. And also one of the things that I really enjoy, too about Public Counsel is you get responsibility right away. Here's 10 files, and here's these difficult, challenging issues and clients, and you are forced right away to handle them. So if you want that type of experience early on in your career, Public Counsel was an excellent way to get that experience.

Austen Parrish 5:53
And I think most of our listeners will know Public Counsel. But can you talk a little bit about what Public Counsel is and what they do broadly?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 6:00
Public Counsel is the nation's largest pro bono law firm, and what they do is they not only recruit great attorneys to represent individuals and work with the courts on promoting access to justice, they also bring in experienced pro bono to partner with them. Many of the attorneys that I got to work with were some of the best attorneys in the country, and we were able to partner with them and bring big cases, small cases, to the forefront, so that individuals who did not have the means to hire an attorney would be able to get great representation and bring these issues to the court. It's a really incredible organization. You manage public counsel's debtors assistance project before you joined the bench, and I know that's the nation's largest bankruptcy pro bono project.

Austen Parrish 6:45
Can you describe a little bit about what you did there and what your impact was, and what is the bankruptcy pro bono project?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 6:51
So the bankruptcy pro bono project was a collaborative effort with the judges regarding issues. They were seen with unrepresented litigants that a complaint would be filed against them, and basically, as somebody who has just filed for bankruptcy, they didn't have the means to hire an attorney, so they reached out to Public Counsel and said, Look, we have a lot of unrepresented litigants who don't know how to navigate the system. They obviously don't have the means to hire an attorney after filing for bankruptcy. Is there any way that we can partner and see if we can get pro bono attorneys to assist them. And the program kind of grew from there. So we started with that small aspect of assisting individuals with representing them and defending non meritorious complaints in the bankruptcy proceedings, and then it grew from there to saying, hey, actually we need much more. We need to provide individuals with assistance with filing their petition, making sure that they are actually filing something that is viable and you know, is warranted given their economic situation. Are there other avenues that they can do, that you can exercise to avoid and to file bankruptcy? So from there, they applied for a grant and got it, and through that grant, I was hired to start the program, and it was really to spearhead the project and make it a national at that time, we just wanted to make it a bigger project. And when I joined Public Council, I saw just tremendous potential, and so I worked extensively with members of the bench who were very committed to access to justice and making the courts more fair. I worked with members of the legal community who are very committed in providing pro bono assistance. And I worked with my colleagues at public council to say, how can we do this with three things in mind, looking at the scope, what are the scope of services we want to provide? How sustainable is it? So we don't want to start something then have it just stop, because we didn't have this. And how do we want it to grow in time, so that individuals it's reliable and people can count on it with Public Counsel. And so we started small. We partnered with also other pro bono organizations to make sure that the efforts that we were taking on were not already being done by somebody else. So it really took a lot of coordination with the courts, with our pro bono partners, with the legal community and with other organizations interests who also had issues that came up when they were impacted by a bankruptcy filing. For example, in our consumer work, sometimes, if we were suing somebody, lo and behold, I felt sometimes as general counsel at Public Counsel, because no matter what the dispute was, somebody would say, you won't believe it, they filed for bankruptcy. What can we do? And so it was a really great way, not only to provide service for individuals seeking bankruptcy assistance, but also in other ways that weren't expected, but were able to provide access to individuals who needed it.

Austen Parrish 9:37
Maybe give our listeners, a little bit of a sense, like, how important is that legal assistance to somebody going through bankruptcy or somebody needing help in that particular way? Maybe you can tease out a little bit. Is it a big impact? Is it a major issue for individuals and families?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 9:52
It's a huge impact. There are so many stories I could tell you. For example, language access was a big issue, and so when I joined Public Council,

I speak, I'm bilingual, so I speak Spanish, and in California, there's a large Spanish speaking population, and so a lot of it was, do you even need to file bankruptcy? And so there's a huge impact there. But I'll share just one story that will highlight this, because I know it's an issue many of your students can relate to, which is the issue of student loans. And so we had an individual who went to a for profit school for massage therapy. I think degree loan was originally28,000 around there, the individual had made payments over 20 years. I fall behind. It was the fees and interest kept increasing. So when they reached out to Public Counsel, the loans in 20 years, even though he had made some payments, had grown from 28,000 to 375,000.

So when he came to Public Counsel, he had filed for bankruptcy. We partnered with a pro bono law firm who took the case, and we were able to get a settlement. We wanted to actually take the case to trial, but with the creditor, realized we're gonna just stop. We really wanted to take the case all the way, and so they offered him a settlement of, I believe, 10 or $15,000 and we made it so that if the settlement, in the settlement terms that if the payments weren't completely made, it would only be that it would be capped at that amount, so wouldn't go back to and at that point, the individual said, Can you guarantee that you will discharge this? And of course, with litigation, you never know how that's going to go. And we said, No, we can't guarantee it, but we think it's a good case. And went back and forth, but he took the settlement, and he said it just changed his life. He had been living with his mother, and she was receiving Social Security. And after having over $350,000

lifted from his shoulders. He was able to basically, he said, I can do that. I can get a job no matter what I'm doing. I can pay this off with 375 accruing interest and fines still going on. I would have never, I would have never, had been able to pay that off. And so that's just one of the stories. There's so many stories I can tell you that were so meaningful that I got to be a part of, either individually or as part of a team that made an impact, a very deep impact, in people's lives. We here at UC Irvine in the law school, we make such a big deal about students doing public interest work. We have a large number of students that come to law school because they want to practice in the public interest area when they graduate. But we also have a lot of other students that know they're going to go into private practice, but we emphasize the importance for their career development and for their professional responsibilities to giving back. So I think 90% of our first year students do a pro bono project in their first year, and we have about 100 pro bono projects going at any given time, because you talk a little bit about the importance of doing public interest work as a law student, or at least through your eyes, what the value of doing that is and why it's important as a lawyer to have that part of your commitment, whether you're in a public interest organization or somewhere else. I think doing public interest work is vital because it really hones your skills to understand the challenges that individuals have when trying to access the legal system. And I think one of the things that I hope for your students that get involved in public interest work, or whether it be government related, is that they bring their new ideas, their new energy, their new innovative ways of how they see the system and how they can make it better, I think, for public interest, for new attorneys, I always say one saying, always keep it because a lot of students say, I don't have enough experience, or what can I do? I don't know very much. I don't and what I say for them is, and I've said this to many of my students, you're never too old to learn, which is something I have to remember, but you're also never too young to lead. And there's a lot of ideas and energy and initiatives that young students now are going to bring to the courts that I'm really excited about. So I hope that the students that go into public interest or work remember this is how it is, but you can go in and try to transform it and make it better.

Austen Parrish 14:04
I think that's great advice. We talked earlier, and you said you had thought about going to law school and becoming a lawyer from a very young age. Did you have ambitions to become a judge when you were at the same time, or when you were at UC Irvine? Did you think that maybe being a judge was in your future?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 14:19
I did not. I really saw myself as a public interest advocate, like I said, that experience and that my mom shared with me left a very big impression on me. So just wasn't something I focused on. I really was focused on, how can I make a difference for the people that normally don't get a voice in the legal system?

Austen Parrish 14:38
No, that makes sense. You are now a judge, and for young lawyers who aspire to follow in your footsteps, can you share a little bit about what it's like being a federal judge and how it's different from practice, and what you've enjoyed most about serving on the bench? I think for me, being a federal judge, first of all, it's amazing. You get to be someone who has a direct impact in shaping how justice is done in our courts.

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 15:04
And given my perspective of what challenges I saw that individuals had, I had a lot of input of what I wanted, and I had a lot of changes of what I wanted to make. For example, let me give you just a couple one I knew the challenges that people faced with regard to language barriers. So right away, first week I'm on the bench, we're going to have language line. So no, because I remember as a young child being put in a position where I was seven, eight, maybe even younger, eight years old, having to translate for individuals in my extended family, and being absolutely terrified. I wanted to do a good job and I wanted to help. And I'm like, I don't know how to I don't know banking terms or how to help you open up a banking I had no idea. And so I when I got on the bench, I was like, that's never gonna happen to anybody appearing before my course. That's number one. Number two, I said we're gonna have hybrid hearings, because I know what an impact it has on individuals struggling at a job. I know what it means to have to take a day off work and the impact that has. And for a lot of these hearings, they could be easily done remotely. And so I said, we're going to make I'm always in court, so people can always come in person, should they choose to. But I that was a top priority. Also, Riverside covers a very large area, so I didn't want individuals who could not afford to have a car or had mobility issues to have to take two or three busses just to get come to my court and then number three. And this is a small point, but I remember as a young attorney, I'm not a person of great stature, and having to go to a podium, and it was up to here, up to my nose, since it's audio, up to my nose. And so I said one of the first things I'm going to do, too, is get an adjustable podium so anybody before my court isn't forced to put themselves on the sideline because the judge can't see them. So those are just a couple of technical changes that I made into my court. And then number two, more fundamentally, I made changes as far as the demeanor that I was going to bring to the court. When I was a young attorney, it was all over the place. Wasn't always a friendly place, let me put it that way, and I made it a top priority in my court that everyone, everyone from myself to my staff, was going to do three things to anybody appearing in my court. Everybody was going to feel safe, meaning nobody was going to disrespect them. Nobody's going to it's rare that somebody wants to go and disrespect the judge, but nobody was going to disrespect opposing counsel or any party before me. People were going to be heard, so I was not going to interrupt people. And this advice was really from one of the judges, which, who advised me early on, said it really takes just as much time to let that person be heard as it does you interrupting them all the time, saying, sir, I've already heard you. And it was wonderful advice, because it's true, people just want to be heard, so I don't interrupt them. I let them be heard. And then number three, to the best of my ability, I will make sure that the person understands why I came to the decision, and even if it's not the decision that they wanted, so that they understand that the process works, and they may not be happy, but at least they can leave the courtroom understanding why I ruled the way I did.

Austen Parrish 18:15
That's such a great philosophy. There's so many studies that show that the way that litigants interact with the court system is so important to their feeling of whether they've obtained justice. And I think I've seen quite a few that suggest that the substance or the outcome is actually maybe, in some ways, often the least important, but it's the level of respect and the treatment throughout the process. So it sounds like those are really important, important changes. And got to say, I like the podium height thing. I hopefully, I think that's brilliant. That makes a lot of sense. We've talked a little bit about public interest, a little bit about judging as a federal judge, and before, when you were in practice, I know you've mentored and supported other lawyers, and we were talking about kind of young lawyers and and how they're treated in court, how they can make such a difference when you're starting out in practice. Can you talk a little bit about how you see the role of mentoring in the profession, and maybe, are there any mentors or yours that come to mind?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 19:07
Absolutely, I've been very fortunate throughout my career, even before my legal career, undergraduate career, law school career, to have just amazing mentors who took me under their wing, encouraged me to write articles, encouraged me to be on committees, encouraged me to apply to the ninth circuit. Who I had no idea what that even was, but a judge basically approached me and said, You need to be on the ninth circuit. You need to apply for this. And I was like, what is it? So I think being a mentor is absolutely vital, and it's played a big role in my life. And I tried to be a mentor as well, to my law clerks, to law students, because it made such an impact in my career. And I will also say one thing about going back to the issue of the federal courts, and I'll come back to the students, which is the bankruptcy courts in particular, are the federal court where the most number of people appear out of any other federal court.

So the impression that people have when are left with when they appear before me can be the impression that they have of all federal courts. And because of that, I take that responsibility very seriously, because that's going to leave an impression that if their fee, if they feel that they have not been treated fairly. That just doesn't impact the bankruptcy court, that impacts their impression of all federal courts. So going back to the students, I think it's vital that as leaders, whether it be on the court, whether it be as yourself in the educational realm or in the public interest field, or partners at law firms that active role to mentor students, because that mentoring has had such an impact on me, but it also has an impact on the way students perceive the profession. Because when somebody goes, you know, at least my experience, when somebody goes out of their way to say, you, I see you as someone that should be in this position, for somebody who's still feeling unsure about what they want to do, it can be just life changing. It can be the difference between, am I going to apply for that or not, and having somebody seek you out and say, I can help you with that, or let me give you some pointers on how to do that. It makes a big difference.

Austen Parrish 21:18
Yeah, those little nudges can really change people's lives a little bit, and it doesn't take a lot. Doesn't take a lot. It doesn't take a lot at all. You mentioned the importance just jumping back a little bit. You mentioned the importance of being heard and having the opportunity as a litigant to say your piece. I think that also seems strikes me the same as that's super important for a young lawyer to know that sometimes that they need to listen to their client and give them time to explain what happened to them. At least in my experience, when I was doing some pro bono work, it was actually being able to be heard by your lawyer and then also being heard by the court. Was that your experience, too, when you were at public counselor or legal aid was, did you have the same sort of thing that half of it was not just explaining the system, but allowing people to tell their stories to you?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 22:00
Absolutely. And I think that one of the dangers of not listening carefully is that you're you make assumptions, and you want to get to the end, so you forget to you forget the middle, and then you have the wrong solution. And so for and I'll give you one example. I had it very early in my career. I had an individual who came to public council and said, somebody filed a bankruptcy in my name. And I was like, what? That makes no sense. What do you mean? I want to erase that bankruptcy. That's not my bankruptcy. And back then, I was like, What? What are you talking to? Never heard of it. So my assumption at that point initially was okay, this is not true. And so in my view, I was like, how am I gonna tell this person? Look, you file for bankruptcy. You can't take away a bankruptcy. And so I dug into despite that, I was like, You know what? Let me get more facts. I dug into it. The person said I've already filed a police report. And that struck me, and I said, Oh, you filed a police report. Okay, so we got his credit reports. It turned out he was absolutely right. Somebody had used his identity and filed a fraudulent bankruptcy in his name, and so we took on the case and got his case expunged. But had I not paused and thought, and the reason so going back? So why would somebody do that? The reason they do that is because when you use somebody else's name on a property that you don't want foreclosed, it puts us basically a stay or an injunction type of relief, and that's why people do it, and then you are invisible because you use somebody else's name to do it. And so at that time, that just seemed impossible. Who would do that? And there are people that do that. So we took on the case. We then I then wrote an article about it, which got published in LA Lawyer magazine. And it did two things. One, it reminded me of the importance of listening and not assuming you know what's going on. And two, I took that opportunity to also educate other attorneys, and years later, an attorney said he had read my article, handled the case for a client based on the same issue, and got that relief. So that's just to show you, you just never know not only the impact that you're going to have on the client that you're helping, but also on other clients that you may not and the only reason I even found out about them is that was appearing on another hearing, and he approached me, I didn't know this attorney, and said, Oh, by the way, I just want to let you know, because of that I did this and this that he told me the whole story. Don't underestimate the impact of the difference that you're going to make, but also how important it really is to listen. Because even as as as unbelievable as it may sound it may be true.

Austen Parrish 24:42
That's great advice. That's great advice. Going back to students, we have a lot of students who, after graduation, have the ambition to clerk if they can. And what do you see as the value of clerking? Or what would you tell students who are thinking about whether clerking makes sense as part of their career path?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 24:57
I think it's a great experience because it gives you a lot, a great opportunity to hone your writing skills, and that is invaluable. It also gives you an inside look to how the courts work and how you can make it better. And so you see all the attorneys appearing, you get to see a bird's eye view of what are the do's, what are the don'ts, and it helps you develop your own style. You know what I tell young attorneys is, be comfortable with your own style, but also it's always what was the saying? As much as I like to learn from my mistake, it's even better to learn from other people's mistakes. And as far as going to court and being a good advocate, a lot of it is common sense. Be prepared. Be on time, be honest, be civil. I think if you can do those basic things, in addition to be being just a great attorney, you're going to impress you're going to impress the judge, you're going to impress your colleagues. But I think working with the judge firsthand, it kind of gives you a bird's eye view to everything of all the considerations that a judge has to balance when making a final decision. I think as an attorney, my role at Public Counsel as an attorney was as an advocate, and so you're really focused on your arguments and making that when you are a judge and you get to clerk for a judge, you get to see the real challenge of how do you balance both of those positions being brought before you in a fair and efficient way? And I think that's really invaluable. It makes you better skill to present an argument that is not so one sided, and that really hones your skill too. I always tell young attorneys, make it easy for me to rule in your favor, and what that means is have a holistic view of the case, because the judge is not going to just consider your position, they're also going to consider the other side. So a really great attorney will take those into consideration and address say, Yes, don't avoid the bad arguments or the weak spots. Take those into consideration, but say, but Your Honor, this is why you still come to my side, because and so I think that can really be valuable insight that a student can gain from clerking or a judge.

Austen Parrish 27:15
It makes a lot of sense. I know what you were saying earlier about mentorship. I've always been struck. There's lots of people in private practice who do are fabulous mentors, but I've been struck on how much that's the ethos on the federal bench, that part of the job, regardless of how busy the judges are, is that they really do take on a mentoring role for their clerks in a real, meaningful way, and build this variation. But I've always thought that sort of getting somebody who's seasoned and has seen different skilled lawyers and ones who are not so skilled that can really make a tremendous difference. I know some people who clerked and 30 years later, they still are in touch with their judge, even though the judge is long retired and it's just a special relationship. Do you have specific recommendations to students if they're thinking about clerking about things they should consider, or ways they should approach their applications? Anything on the logistics side there?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 28:03
I would say clerking is such a wonderful experience. I would say that if the logistical parties, of course, do well and have a great resume and all that. But also, in your cover letter, explain, why do you want to do this? I think that sometimes, and I would say this, regardless of what career you're endeavoring to take on, which is really look at why you want to do it. Because I think with some of the most meaningful cover letters that I read really come from, it's from the heart, and they tell me why it means so much. Why would mean so much to clerk for my chambers, I get wonderful resumes with great academic credentials. But I think sometimes, and I know why you do it. I was a young student too. You think, Okay, this is I really have to focus on my studies and having this great resume. But I think at the end of the day, once you get there, the difference between somebody who gets interviewed and gets a position is going to be, why is this important to you? Why are you doing this? Then do you have a commitment to public service? And because really, for a clerk, ultimately, what you're doing is you're helping the judge serve the public, and have that commitment of service come through.

Because that's ultimately what you're doing. You're going to get, how do I say this? You're going to get varying degrees of pleadings, of levels of clarity and completeness, and so it really is important for a clerk interested in clerking to realize that and to be approach the people appearing before the court in a compassionate and kind way. Because I always tell clerks even when it when, when it's a tough week, everyone's doing the best they can. And if you can start from that premise, you can more easily make sure that justice is being done.

Austen Parrish 29:13
You mentioned resume buildings, if you look back at your own time at UC Irvine or at UCLA for law school, are there things you wish you had taken more advantage of or things maybe you would have done differently?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 29:46
When you ask that question. It's interesting, because I really had a great experience at UC Irvine, but I would say two things. One is, I wish I would have taken a year abroad. That was an opportunity that I had thought about, but I just didn't do it. And I wish I would have had that. And two, and I don't know if this is something specific to UCI, but I wish I would have really appreciated the relationships more along the way, rather than being so academically focused and goal oriented, because time goes by fast, and I when I think about when you look back now at my age, the memories that I have of UCI are not of me staying up till three in the morning trying to get that it's about those experiences, conversations I had with professors during their office hours, or experiences I had with students from all over the country that or and all over the world that came to UC Irvine. I remember during my first week, I was, you're in a crowd, and you know, you're going to all these orientations, and I met somebody from Africa. And I was just, I was like, wow, like, from Africa, and you're here and I'm here. And I just thought that was amazing, I thought, and then I met students from China, and I was just, you know, you go from high school, and then you realize the world is really big, and I wish I had taken more time to slow down and get to know their experiences. What is it like you're coming from Africa, coming to the US? What's What's that experiences like? How are you liking it, and do you enjoy and he was, I still remember his face this many years later, and I remember thinking, if I had just not been so Okay, I gotta get to the seminar. I would have loved to have just stopped and said, Let's have coffee. I was not that confident, either, but I wish I would have appreciated those little moments.

Speaker 1 31:45
And then third, I will say one last thing. I wish I would have relaxed a little bit of knowing it's going to work out fine, and focused more on not the goal of where I need to get or not making mistakes or thinking something calamitous was going to happen if I didn't do well in this class. But instead focus on, how am I going to develop the skills that when trials and tribulations come my way, when encounter failure, when I do this, that I'm going to have the wherewithal to say, Okay, I got this, and then move on. And so I think for all students, and it's hard to do because you only, unfortunately, sometimes get that through experience. But I would say, I hope that all students that go are going to usci realize they're going to do great things. It's going to be tough. You're going to encounter some challenges, but you're going to do great I think that advice is even more important now than it was when we were an undergraduate, because there's so much pressure now for people to be career focused and not just do well, but make decisions that they think are going to lock them in over a period of time, and that's taking time to smell the roses and really get the most out of the experience, I think is so critical. I was meeting with some pre law students just last week, and it was the same thing. They were hoping that if they just ticked every single box. It was guaranteed them admission to certain law schools. And I was very much, I think, suggesting the same as you were, which was, just take, make the most out of it then, and law school will take care of itself. Just do the best and enjoy the experience. And as you say, connect with your classmates and connect with your faculty.

Austen Parrish 33:16
I think it's just such great advice. Do you have any other last words of advice for our listeners as we come to a close of this episode?

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 33:23
Yeah, I would say one, one thing that I hope for your students to know is that the importance of risks and making sure that there's this famous Mae West saying which is, you only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough, and I think for students, it's be willing to take chances. Be willing to be courageous when it's hard to do. Be willing to have hope and faith that when you do the right thing, it's going to work out in the end. It might not always be the easy thing at the moment, but building those blocks of character really matter long term, and don't make compromises on the value, on the things that you value. So at it may be, it may seem easy at the time to say, oh, I'll just let that go, or I won't speak up, or I won't do anything, but I've seen through my experience, people that have made those compromises, it hasn't worked out well long term, even though in the short term, it worked out well. So I would encourage especially now, be courageous, have hope that things are going to work out and never compromise your values, because at the end of the day, that's what's going to make you proud of your work and proud of what you've accomplished.

Austen Parrish 34:44
Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux, it's been absolutely terrific. We're so proud that you're an Anteater in Law and we can call you a UCI alum. So thank you for spending time. I know how busy you are, and we appreciate you joining the podcast. Thanks for being a guest on UCI Law Talks.

Judge Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux 34:57
Thank you so much. It was my pleasure.

Outro 35:03
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