NOORANI'S NOTES

 

 

A promising development: On Wednesday, a group of
bipartisan senators discussed immigration reform for the first time
this Congress, report Sabrina Rodriguez, Burgess Everett and Marianne
Levine of Politico
. 

Addressing the increase in asylum seekers and unaccompanied children at
the border was front and center. "You've got people all over the map,
but I think if we really want to get something done then I think we're
going to have to try to show we're working on what's happening at
the border right now," said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). 

"It was a good first discussion," said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North
Carolina). A follow-up meeting is in the works.  

The meeting came as President Joe Biden assigned Vice President Kamala
Harris to lead a key component of the response to the border
situation: Coordination with Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El
Salvador. Harris will work to address root causes of migration and
strengthen diplomatic ties, report Jonathan Lemire, Nomaan Merchant,
Lisa Mascaro and Aamer Madhani of the Associated Press
. A delegation
of White House officials and members of Congress traveled to the
southern border Wednesday to tour a facility for migrant children in
Carrizo Springs, Texas. 

Welcome to Thursday's edition of Noorani's Notes.
I'm Dan Gordon, Vice President of Strategic Communications at the
Forum and your guest editor today. If you have a story to share from
your own community, please send it to me
at [email protected]
. 

[link removed]

**MORE TEXAS SHELTERS** - The Biden administration plans to open a
second facility to house unaccompanied minors in Carrizo Springs,
reports Celine Castronuovo of The Hill
.
The facility reportedly can house up to 500 children, with the potential
to expand. The existing facility in Carrizo Springs has room for as
many as 700 children ages 13 to 17. At Politico
, Benjamin
Din reports that the Department of Health and Human Services has asked
the Department of Defense to use military Joint Base San
Antonio-Lackland and Fort Bliss in Texas to house migrant children
temporarily. The Pentagon is considering the request. Utilizing
Department of Defense bases - and convention centers, as planned in
San Diego, per the Union-Tribune
 -
are important steps in the short-term. 

**HUMANITY** - The journey of a 7-year-old girl alone across the
U.S.-Mexico border "illustrates the extraordinary risks taken by migrant
parents to get their children across the border, even if it means
abandoning them for the most perilous part of the trip," reports Adriana
Gomez Licon of the Associated Press
. The girl
says her father traveled with her for 22 days from Honduras.
Apparently, after the pair were expelled from the U.S. under
pandemic-era policy, the father sent his daughter to cross without
him. What the girl and her father might have been fleeing is the
subject of an important op-ed in the Washington Post
: León
Krauze emphasizes "the very concrete context of human suffering" that
is sometimes missing from coverage of the situation at the border. "If
the alternative was famine, gang violence, kidnapping, rape or sexual
slavery, wouldn't you bet it all on the journey north?" Krauze
writes. 

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**HUMANITY, CONTINUED** - In Forbes
, Stuart
Anderson speaks with Dree Collopy, chair of the American Immigration
Lawyers Association's (AILA) National Asylum and Refugee Liaison
Committee and author of the book "Asylum Primer." Read it through, but
a key point comes early on: "Nothing any U.S. president says is going
to stop people from fleeing violence. Doing so is akin to telling
someone to stay in a burning house," Collopy says. Another Q&A,
this one in The New Yorker
 [paywall], delves into
the humanitarian issues at the border. Isaac
Chotiner speaks with Neha Desai, director of immigration at
the National Center for Youth Law . "First and
foremost, this entire issue needs to be seen through the lens of the
fact that these are children fleeing for their lives," Desai says. "
... I think what is most striking to me is the bravery and resilience
of these children." 

**ROSA** - The Rev. Rich Nathan, founding pastor of Vineyard Columbus
in Ohio, brings both a biblical and personal perspective to the need
for a solution for Dreamers in a Columbus Dispatch
 op-ed. Nathan
tells the story of Rosa, a congregant who "worked hard to learn English
and became an excellent student" and now is a medical assistant with a
Christian nonprofit. "Through no fault of their own, these Dreamers
were brought to this country as children," Nathan writes. "The Bible
sets forth this principle of justice: children should not suffer for
the sins of their parents! Dreamers work hard for a better life here;
they deserve the opportunity to achieve one."  

**STOPPING HATE** - On a special episode of Only in America
 this
week, Ali speaks with John C. Yang, President and Executive Director
of Asian Americans Advancing Justice
, in the
wake of last week's shootings in Atlanta - part of a tragic rise in
hate crimes against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders across the
country. Yang shares what he's hearing from organizers and partners
on the ground, and how we can use this as a moment of change.  

Thanks for reading,  

Dan 

 

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