Dear Friends,
I hope this update finds you and your loved ones safe. Over the past few weeks, we've been reflecting on the moment we’re in right now and what it means for both our movement and our work. So many of us are experiencing outrage, grief, and pain, yet I also feel the energy and hope for transformative change that has been built on decades of work, led by Black people and other people of color putting their bodies on the line to challenge systemic racism and anti-Blackness at every level. I wanted to share the statement we made with our national collaborative Immigrant Justice Network standing with Black communities across the country who are rising up to demand real justice and a profound transformation of our society and institutions. In it, we said that “We stand with the call which leaders in the Black Lives Matter movement have posed: those of us who were willing to say #AbolishICE must be willing to say #DefundThePolice as well… Together, through the power of true solidarity, we can transform our institutions and build a better world. We must not only proclaim loudly that #BlackLivesMatter, but we must take concrete action to make that statement a reality.”
On that note, I want to invite you to join us in taking action and share some of our recent work with you.
In solidarity,
Alisa
Also, to read reflections on the current moment from IDP's ICE Raids and Local Policy teams jump here.
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Take action today!
Here are a few actions you can take in light of the current political moment:
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Know Your Rights for Immigrant Protesters
IDP worked to ensure that immigrants had access to crucial information about the risks of protesting, measures to take to remain safe, and resources for reaching attorneys either before a protest, or in the case of an arrest. We drew from our work tracking ICE enforcement and advising defense attorneys to contribute to resources published specifically for immigrant protesters.
IDP hotline open to counsel immigrants about the right to protest
Many immigrants are called to protest but want information about how attending a protest or being arrested at a protest could impact their immigration status. The IDP hotline is open to providing this crucial advice about the right to protest. Our staff draw from their expertise about the intersections of criminal and immigration law and ICE enforcement to educate immigrants about risks and strategies to mitigate negative outcomes. IDP’s hotline remains true to its goal of empowering immigrants by helping them make informed decisions about when and how to engage in public demonstrations.
- What If I Get Arrested While I'm Protesting (Created by NLG-NYC)
IDP staff and volunteers prepare to advise immigrants arrested during protests
In the last few weeks in New York and across the country, thousands of people have been arrested for participating in protests challenging systemic racism and anti-Blackness. Many of those arrested are not U.S. citizens and face harsh immigration consequences for their protest participation. Though some District Attorneys have said they will not arrest protesters, it is too soon to tell how many cases will be dismissed. In addition, the mere fact of an arrest can have negative consequences for some immigrants. IDP staff and pro bono volunteers are preparing to ensure that immigrant protesters and their defense attorneys have access to individualized immigration advice about how an arrest impacts their status.
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Supporting the fight to #FreeThemAll through advocacy and litigation
IDP, American Friends Service Committee, and the Immigrant Rights Clinic at New York University School of Law filed a class-action lawsuit seeking the release of all individuals detained at Elizabeth Detention Center, a private prison facility operated by CoreCivic in NJ. Through this class action, we seek not only to free these individuals but also to further a larger campaign against detention and deportation, which disproportionately targets and impacts Black immigrants. IDP and its partners are working closely with community organizations and hunger strikers to support their demands and actions and to expose ICE’s egregious policies and disregard for human rights. We and our partners have already been able to secure some vulnerable clients’ freedom through habeas litigation and advocacy. We are also helping local partners uplift the voices of people organizing inside detention to #FreeThemAll, including Black immigrants and allies who are also speaking out in support of #BlackLivesMatter.
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With all the activity, we are pausing to reflect on how to ground our work in the tremendous outrage and resistance that has sprung up in response to state violence and policing. IDP stands alongside and in solidarity with those leading the struggle to dismantle the brutal systems that drive racialized police oppression and to mourn the loss of too many lives to the violence of the carceral system. The spotlight on racist anti-Black police violence following the murders of George Floyd, Breanna Taylor, Tony McDade, and too many others, has unleashed a wave of uprisings across the country, amplifying bold demands to #DefundPolice and #DefendBlackLives, and opening up the possibility for radical transformation.
This moment springs from a recognition of the urgency to undo the deep-seated harms of white supremacy and anti-Blackness. This moment also builds off of decades of resistance, organizing, and theorizing about abolition as a means to imagine a world that replaces police and prisons with an alternate vision of community safety; one that centers community well-being, economic and social equality, and freedom from oppression.
IDP was founded over 20 years ago to address injustices at the intersection of the criminal legal and immigration systems. Since then, the U.S. border exclusion and deportation regime has grown to become the world’s largest, forcibly excluding and exiling millions annually as a normalized state practice.
A key function of policing, whether you’re talking about NYPD or ICE and CBP’s migration policing, is to maintain social control and a highly unequal status quo. ICE has increasingly relied on the well-developed logics of racialized policing and punishment, to justify a state of emergency centered around the constructed threat of immigrant criminality. Central to this is the idea that certain bodies represent a perpetual threat and therefore deserve extreme punishment including death. ICE has also opportunistically latched on to local policing and the state prison system to increase their reach. ICE roams around NYC neighborhoods, surveilling and arresting immigrants at home, at work, at courthouses, and on the street. And now ICE has joined forces with the NYPD to repress the protests against the very violence they perpetuate.
To challenge state reliance on policing and punishment over true safety and security, we have been building with our allies through the Justice Roadmap. On June 9, we and over 190 organizations called on the NYS legislators to address racist violence from policing to courts to jails and prisons. We will continue to strategize collectively to further advance the work to end the lethal grip of the policing and prison system as we celebrate the passage of the repeal of 50-a, the Police STAT Act, and the Special Prosecutor Bill, a tremendous victory after years of organizing led by Communities United for Police Reform. We also continue our clemency work to end perpetual punishment, including people sentenced to die in prison and noncitizens facing permanent exile.
This moment offers the possibility of transformation, and a time to imagine beyond the institutions and paradigms that we live in. It’s time to defund policing and invest in communities. But there’s no guarantee that a spotlight on oppression means that we will come out of this moment stronger, and so we must be disciplined to lay the groundwork to set us on the path of dismantling the system, rather than settling for options that reinforce oppressive structures, dressed up as change.
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IDP New York turns spotlight towards state violence, egregious policing, & ICE presence at actions in NYC
IDP in the Media
This week, IDP highlighted ICE collusion with NYPD at protests against police violence, and ICE violence more broadly.
New York State takes a step towards transparency and police accountability by repealing 50-a
Today, June 12, Governor Cuomo signed the full repeal of 50a into law, a first step toward increasing transparency around police misconduct. IDP has supported the campaign to #Repeal50a as a member of Communities for Police Reform and as part of the Justice Roadmap's slate of reforms necessary to #DefendBlackLives and challenge racist state violence in New York's police, jails, and prisons.
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Want to support IDP's work in the fight for immigrant rights? Sign up today become one of our monthly sustainers! Committing to give to IDP throughout 2020 provides consistent support for our work in the struggle for fairness and justice for all immigrants. |
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