"The day it goes into effect, it will disastrously make every Texan less safe by eroding fundamental community trust with law enforcement," Corbett says. 

Meanwhile, Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso (and a Forum board member) writes of his own struggle with turning anger into action in the face of so much uncertainty and danger for the communities he serves. In his El Paso Times op-ed, Seitz writes that by holding up migrants' humanity, he believes we can find humane solutions. 

"My hope is that our Christmas and holiday celebrations this year will be occasions to turn compassion, grief and anger into responsibility and action, to build a world worthy of a God who so treasures the vulnerable that he became one of them," he writes.  

As Myah Ward, Lauren Egan And Benjamin Johansen of Politico add context on the continuation of Senate negotiations into the new year, Marisa Limón Garza, executive director at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, writes in The Messenger that Congress should change its focus: "Welcome — unlike all the deterrence, harsh and inhumane treatment, closing of legal pathways and growing criminal penalties — is the only thing that we’ve seen actually works." 

Welcome to Thursday’s edition of The Forum Daily. I’m Dan Gordon, the Forum’s strategic communications VP, and the great Forum Daily team also includes Jillian Clark, Isabella Miller, Clara Villatoro and Darika Verdugo. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected].  

NORTHBOUND — For many migrants making the journey through the Darién Gap, "an enormous digital almanac" of social media posts is offering guidance and encouragement, reports Julie Turkewitz of The New York Times. The posts can be a boon to host platforms, but smugglers also are using them to target migrants, Turkewitz notes. "There’s no doubt that the U.S. government can sometimes not move as quickly as some of the bad actors that we’ve seen working online," said Blas Nuñez-Neto, DHS assistant secretary for border and immigration policy. A team at CNN has more on the increase in migration facilitated by illegitimate travel agencies and organized transport networks. 

MEDICAL DEPORTATION —Philadelphia is the first city to ban the practice of medical deportation, or removal of someone in a health care setting without their consent, reports Vicky Diaz-Camacho for WHYY. "This bill will get people the opportunity to have information about their loved ones’ health care needs, in their own language, and make sure that they are able to decide if they want their loved one to receive care here in the United States or in another country," said Adrianna Torres-Garcia of the Free Migration Project. 

DEMOGRAPHIC SHIFT — An increasing number of middle-class Chinese migrants are trying to reach the U.S. in search of a better life, Shawn Donnan of Bloomberg reports. And more migrants from Asia, as well as from Africa, are arriving at the Arizona border, reports Addie Offereins of World magazine. "The change that we’ve seen in terms of the makeup of the nationalities coming to the border … in many ways just reflects the dysfunction of our system," said Laurence Benenson, the Forum’s VP of Policy and Advocacy.  

JOY — In Denver, 1,500 migrant children will enjoy presents for the holidays thanks to a community donation effort, reports Shannon Ogden for ABC7 Denver. Families gathered in the lobby of a hotel-turned-shelter so that their children could choose two toys apiece. Bret Walker of the City of Denver said of the efforts, "They've been through a lot. They've traveled. We wanted to just bring some joy to their life and get them a toy." 

Thanks for reading,  

Dan