Dear Freedom for Immigrants’ Volunteers, Supporters, & Friends,

Below please find Freedom for Immigrants Summer Quarterly Newsletter. You can also view and share it here <[link removed]>. We hope you enjoy learning about what we have been up to, and if you are interested in supporting our work, don’t hesitate to reach out or make a tax-deductible donation <[link removed]> today!

Warm regards,

Christina M. Fialho | She/Her/Hers
Co-Founder/Executive Director
FREEDOM for IMMIGRANTS
Office: 310-765-4044 (Los Angeles, CA)
www.freedomforimmigrants.org <[link removed]>

Freedom for Immigrants is working to abolish immigration detention. Learn more <[link removed]> & donate here <[link removed]>.

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>> Freedom for Immigrants Newsletter: Summer 2020
>> Dear Friends & Supporters,
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>> We hope you are doing well and staying healthy. The summer has quickly faded to fall, and 2020 has been an unbelievably heavy year for us all. As we all prepare to vote in the upcoming election, we at Freedom for Immigrants (formerly CIVIC) <[link removed]> are reflecting on the last few years.
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>> It has been some of the most difficult years, but we have achieved so much together! And we wanted to take a moment to share our reflections and thank you for your support.
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>> In 2016, just before the last presidential election, we partnered with then California State Senator Ricardo Lara and the Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) to introduce groundbreaking legislation in California, a state that used to detain a quarter of all people in immigration detention each year.
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>> The bill was called the Dignity Not Detention Act (SB 1289) <[link removed]>, and it has taken four years and an entire movement to pass every aspect of that original law, but together we have done it!
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>> SB 1289 set out to stop the expansion of immigration detention in California by prohibiting private, for-profit companies from operating immigrant prisons. It also aimed to ensure the health and rights of people in immigration detention were protected by creating a private right of action to sue. SB 1289 passed the legislature in 2016, but was vetoed that year by then Governor Brown.
>> In the following years, Freedom for Immigrants was a founding member of the Dignity Not Detention Coalition, along with other organizations such as the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance, Human Rights Watch, and PICO. Together, we passed SB 29 <[link removed]> and an amendment in the state budget AB 103 <[link removed]> the following year to put a moratorium on private and public immigration detention expansion and give the state attorney general the power and resources to monitor detention conditions.
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>> With allies fighting against the criminal imprisonment system, the Dignity Not Detention Coalition passed AB 32 <[link removed]> in 2019 to phase out private prisons in both the criminal and immigration context. And building on this legacy, AB 3228 <[link removed]> was passed this Summer, providing people in immigration detention with a private right of action.
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>> Together we have achieved Dignity Not Detention, but we cannot forget this legacy. None of this would have been possible without people like Carlos Hidalgo, Shannah Abdulluah, Ibrahim Karim, and the more than 400 brave people who went on hunger strike in late 2015 <[link removed]> at the Adelanto Detention Facility. They put their lives on the line to call attention to the abusive immigration detention system, and it was because of them <[link removed]> that Senator Ricardo Lara introduced our original bill.
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>> There is more work to be done! Freedom for Immigrants is working with our partners to enforce these laws through litigation and advocacy. And we are working to ensure that other states like Maryland <[link removed]> and Washington <[link removed]> follow California's lead, while pushing for a federal moratorium <[link removed]> on immigration detention expansion.
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>> Your ongoing support and commitment fuels us to continue fighting for justice, and we will not stop until immigration detention is abolished.
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>> In solidarity,
>>
>> Christina Fialho
>> Co-Founder/Executive Director
>> Freedom for Immigrants
>> Continue on this journey with us!
>> <[link removed]>
>> Litigation & Policy Advocacy
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>> We Sued a Private Prison and California City to Stop Detention Expansion: We sued the City of McFarland (and GEO Group) to halt the expansion of two new immigrant prisons in California and enforce elements of SB 29. We won a preliminary injunction <[link removed]>. While one of the prisons has opened, we are continuing to fight this in the courts.
>> We Are Enforcing the Law in a City with the Largest Immigrant Prison: After appealing <[link removed]> the City of Adelanto’s Planning Commission decision to expand the largest immigrant prison in the country by 750 bids, Freedom for Immigrants presented at the City Council appeal meeting, which lasted until 3 a.m. the next morning. After two failed motions at the council meeting, we sent a cease and desist letter <[link removed]> with our partners to prevent the expansion.
>> We Sued a County Jail in Alabama to Safeguard the Rights of Visitors & Protesters: Freedom for Immigrants convenes a national network of immigration detention visitation groups. Since 2013, the government has infringed on the First Amendment rights of these programs over a dozen times. Freedom for Immigrants has successfully fought for reinstatement of visitation rights in each of these instances. This time, we have had enough. Along with the Etowah Visitation Project, we sued the Etowah County Sheriff’s Department <[link removed]> in federal court.
>> We introduced the End Transfers of Detained Immigrants Act with U.S. Senators Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), calling for a moratorium on transfers between ICE detention facilities, between criminal custody and ICE, and between child detention facilities and ICE facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Freedom for Immigrants helped draft legislation with the Senator’s office, and we acted as the lead supporting organization to engage other advocates. This bill is groundbreaking in a number of ways, but most notably, it would prevent children from being transferred on their 18th birthday to an adult immigration detention facility.
>> Detention Monitoring & Investigations
>> Immigration detention is at an all-time low at under 20,000 people, down from over 50,000 at the beginning of the year. This is due to the strength of the detention abolition broader movement to ensure release. However, at least eight people have died in immigration detention due to COVID-19, and the rate of infection is at 18 percent, far higher than the national or global averages.
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>> Freedom for Immigrants is continuing to host an interactive detention map <[link removed]>which includes real-time mapping of ICE's lethal responses to COVID-19. As the number of cases continue to rise in ICE jails and prisons, we continue to express great concern.
>> Spotlight on a Visitation Group
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>> Freedom for Immigrants convenes a national network of visitation groups <[link removed]>, operating in 69 of the largest immigrant prisons in 26 states. We want to give a huge shout out to our affiliated visitation group, the South Georgia Immigrant Support Network <[link removed]>, that filed a complaint about unwanted medical procedures, including hysterectomies, at the Irwin County Detention Center in Georgia. Dawn Wooten, a nurse who used to work at the facility and whistleblower in the complaint explained how women at the facility told her that their uteruses had been removed without their consent.
>> While this whistleblower complaint details forced hysterectomies at one facility, we know that abuse and many other forms of medical neglect against people detained is happening in ICE jails all over the United States. This complaint has led to a federal investigation. Read more here <[link removed]>.
>> Decarceration Strategies
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>> New Impact Investment Fund to Free Immigrants: In partnership with Mission Driven Finance, we launched the Freedom100 Fund <[link removed]>, featured in Forbes Magazine! In the last few years, Freedom for Immigrants has posted $2.4 million in immigration bonds to secure the freedom for 335 people. The Freedom100 Fund will allow us to blend philanthropic and investment capital to more rapidly free more people. Since we launched in August, we have secured the freedom of 44 children, adults, and families with over $500K paid in bond!
>> Release on Parole: We supported an additional 107 individuals with humanitarian and asylum parole requests as well as Fraihat custody redetermination letters.
>> Release to Sponsors: We have recruited nearly 3,000 volunteers willing to welcome people into their homes to prevent detention or secure their release.
>> Spotlight on Freedom:
>> Yosif is a young man from Cuba who was detained in La Palma Correctional Center for nearly a year. In April, we began to support Yosif and his family in advocating for his release on humanitarian parole due to the high risk caused by his severe asthma. After an outbreak in La Palma in May, Yosif was put into solitary confinement in retaliation for his refusal to work his kitchen “job” due to his concerns about getting infected. By June, Yosif was reporting shortage of breath and heart palpitations. He was finally released in mid-August, and is now in Florida with his family.
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>> With the generous support of The Peggy & Jack Baskin Foundation, we were able to bond out Maritiza, a trans woman originally from Mexico. Maritiza grew up and lived in Monterey County for 40 years. She was detained by ICE and transferred to a detention facility in Louisiana, away from her family and community, where she spent 17 months. We were able to pay her $10,000 bond, welcome her into our safe home in Louisiana <[link removed]>, and then reunite her with her family in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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>> Pledge Your Support Today to Welcome Immigrants!
>> <[link removed]>
>> Narrative Change
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>> Why Abolition Wednesdays Instagram Live Series: We led 8 IG live chats over the course of 8 weeks to educate the public about the ins and outs of abolishing immigration detention, reaching over 30,000 people. You can check them out and follow us for more news here <[link removed]>.
>> Imm-Print Newsletter: We are helping to change the narrative on immigration detention by ensuring people in detention have a platform to share their words and art. We published dozens of articles this summer from people in immigration detention, and our latest issue of the Imm-Print <[link removed]> newsletter was sent to hundreds of individuals in immigration detention.
>> In Plain Sight: We partnered with a coalition of 80 artists to create a unique project dedicated to the abolition of U.S. immigrant detention and the culture of incarceration. Over Independence Day Weekend, the coalition launched the nation's skytyping fleets to spell out artist-generated messages in water vapor, legible for miles over immigrant prisons, immigration courts, borders, and other sites of historic relevance. We supported the coalition in locating appropriate places with our map <[link removed]> and contributed language <[link removed]> for the skytyping, and we ensured people in detention were aware of the action.
>> IMM-Print Poetry: In an Ocean
>> <[link removed]>
>> Inclined in the evening
>> I throw my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes
>> your eyes, for me, the light of a distant lighthouse
>> with effort and resolve, I try to reach
>> No matter the hours, days, months, years
>> I need to navigate to reach
>> your warm and gentle coral lips.
>> Eyes like oceanic pearls, you are the light God placed
>> for this sad and solitary boat
>> Only your light guides an ocean of tenderness and love….
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>> by Alonso Flores, currently detained at Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, WA
>> Farewell Cynthia and Welcome Amanda!
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>> In 2017, Cynthia Galaz joined Freedom for Immigrants as our fourth staff member. As the National Hotline Director & Policy Monitor, Cynthia successfully established and expanded the national detention hotline as a powerful monitoring tool. She has contributed to several monitoring and policy reports, documenting the abuses received from the hotline perpetrated at the hands of ICE.
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>> Cynthia has successfully navigated the hotline through 3 shutdowns, multiple lawsuits, and has managed a team of over 40 hotline volunteers who answer an average of 5,000 calls per month! She has been an invaluable member to this team and we will greatly miss her creative spirit, positive energy and overwhelming kind heart. We are so grateful for her tremendous support and leadership over these past 3 years and wish her all the best in her graduate program at Oxford University! She will forever remain part of the Freedom for Immigrants family!
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>> Before Cynthia left for England, she had the opportunity to sit down with our newest member of the team, Amanda Diaz, who joins us as the new National Hotline Manager. Amanda was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her experiences as a child of undocumented immigrants fueled her interest and incited a sense of obligation and commitment to detention abolition, liberation, and dignity for undocumented people.
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>> Amanda was first exposed to her abolitionist values as an undergraduate learning about egregious human rights violations at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington. She founded Advocates for Detained Voices, a campus organization, that works alongside La Resistencia, a grassroots undocumented-led grassroots organization. Prior to joining Freedom for Immigrants, Amanda was a community organizer for an immigrants-rights organization in Seattle. Amanda built a powerful base of committed leaders that ran local issue campaigns, and also trained grassroots leaders in Washington to lobby for state legislation to oppose the construction and expansion of additional jails and detention centers, getting ICE out of courts, fighting to create Washington as a sanctuary state, and advocating for state-wide dual-language education.
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>> Amanda graduated from the University of Puget Sound, creating her own B.A. by combining disciplines that explored the importance of race and ethnic politics, narratives, knowledge, and power, and their relationship to questions of law, immigration, and national politics all over the Americas. We are excited to welcome Amanda to the team!
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>> A Word of Thanks!
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>> We want to thank you for believing in us and for believing that abolishing immigration detention is possible. We strongly believe that in order to effect change in the world, you have to believe that the change is possible. We know that with your support we can and will end immigration detention in the United States not just in our lifetimes, but soon. This quarter, we want to especially thank:
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>> The Elevate Fund for the $50,000 match grant they provided to help us raise $100,000 for our bond program;
>> The rock band, Badflower, and their wonderful fan base that raised $10,000;
>> Orange Is The New Black’s Vicci Martinez and Emily Tarver that put on an uplifting virtual concert <[link removed]> for Freedom for Immigrants with support from Olivia.com <[link removed]>;
>> Broadway actress Shoshana Bean <[link removed]> who took to Instagram to call on her supporters to help us end immigration detention; and
>> Tal Mars who hiked the length of Vermont to raise funds and awareness.
>> FREE THEM ALL!
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>> Copyright © 2020 Freedom for Immigrants, All rights reserved.
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>> Our mailing address is:
>> 1322 Webster Street, Suite 300
>> Oakland, CA 94612
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