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Tell Congress:
"ICE detention centers were a disaster before the pandemic, but now immigrants are facing potentially deadly consequences of being exposed to COVID-19. Congress must reduce funding to ICE for detention operations and shift to community-based alternatives to immigration detention that are not driven by profit."
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John,
Immigration keeps America strong. This has been true for generations. But the Trump Administration has subjected those seeking a better life in the U.S. to inhumane, illegal conditions—including thousands of children being ripped away from their families.
Now, in the midst of the pandemic, the dire situation faced by detained immigrants is getting even worse. Due at least in part to the dreadful state of ICE detention centers, detained immigrants are being exposed to COVID-19 at alarming rates, increasing the spread of the virus at home and abroad.
Add your name! Join CHN and our national coalition to demand Congress reduce funding to ICE detention centers, which are separating families and putting lives at risk during the pandemic. Instead, Congress must shift to community-based alternatives that are not driven by profit.
The failings of ICE during the pandemic are well documented. According to the New York Times:1
“Even as lockdowns and other measures have been taken around the world to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, ICE has continued to detain people, move them from state to state and deport them. An investigation by The New York Times in collaboration with The Marshall Project reveals how unsafe conditions and scattershot testing helped turn ICE into a domestic and global spreader of the virus — and how pressure from the Trump administration led countries to take in sick deportees.”
Immigrants who are being detained at ICE facilities have raised concerns over their inability to practice social distancing and lack of sanitation materials, including soap. The number of COVID-19 cases among detained immigrants recently crossed 3,000, according to NBC News.2
The pandemic risks turning detention at an ICE facility into a death sentence. We need Congress to act.
Congress must reduce funding to ICE for detention operations and shift to community-based alternatives to immigration detention that are not driven by profit. Private industries, who are detaining immigrants, should not be able to profit from an inhumane system.
Together, we must sound a loud, clear signal to Congress to stop funding ICE detention centers. Sign if you agree!
Thank you for all you do to fight for struggling families, the poor and the vulnerable during this challenging time.
Deborah Weinstein
Executive Director, Coalition on Human Needs
1 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/10/us/ice-coronavirus-deportation.html
2 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/private-firms-run-ice-detention-centers-promise-congress-they-ll-n1233673
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