John -- “Residential centers.” That’s what ICE cynically calls the jails it locks families in, where some children have been held for over a year, despite overwhelming evidence of long-term trauma and even physical impacts of being locked up.
COVID is so rampant in these ICE jails that infections are 13 times higher than the national average in some facilities. In fact, just yesterday, one of our partners alerted us that many families have tested positive at a family facility in Texas.
No child, no parent, no family should be forced to suffer this horror, but this is the sick and twisted alternate reality that thousands of children were put into last year alone.
Families Belong Together is working tirelessly to draw attention to these horrific conditions and fight for families to be released, reunited, and supported on the long road to recovery.
Today is Giving Tuesday, a national day of giving created to follow Black Friday with an outpouring of support for charities and nonprofits. We need to raise $20,000 fast, so if you’re able, I urge you to donate $25 to help us reach this key goal.
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In one ICE detention facility in Georgia dozens of women say a gynecologist operated on them without their consent -- he was even called the ‘uterus collector’.
It might be the most shocking revelation to date, but don’t for a minute think this is an isolated incident. This Georgia jail is run by a massive private corporation that runs seven facilities in four states and has an abysmal track record of denying medical care, basic hygiene, and abuse.
It’s been an overwhelming and exhausting year to say the least. But 2020 is also a year to reflect on the system that has led to the atrocities we’ve seen -- and continue to see. How did we get here -- and how do we move forward?
At Families Belong Together, we’ve got a sophisticated strategy tackling this at multiple levels: reunifying families, supporting on-the-ground partners, blowing the whistle on abuses in custody, and fighting to right the wrongs over the long term. But it’s also about questioning a system that is driven by an addiction to punishment and cruelty.
We have our work cut out for us, but we have seen time and again when we come together we can make profound changes to end the horrors being done in our name -- and to make sure it doesn’t happen again. And to do that I need to ask:
If you're able, please make a $25 gift to Families Belong Together to help us reach our $20,000 goal for Giving Tuesday. Every single dollar you give will fund our work, from reuniting separated families, supporting immigrant communities, building a more tolerant world today, and beyond.
At its core, our work at Families Belong Together is about healing. It's about reuniting families that were ripped apart at the border, ensuring families and children are safe and with people who love them -- not locked away.
Let’s make 2021 the year we turn the corner on this horrific chapter of our country’s history.
Thank you so much, for everything you do.
Sincerely,
Paola Luisi, Director
Families Belong Together
Families Belong Together is a campaign of the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA). NDWA is the nation's leading voice for dignity and fairness for the millions of domestic workers in the United States, most of whom are women. If you would like to get in touch with Families Belong Together, click here.
