By Abby Zimet / Common Dreams
What fresh hell is this? In yet another mindlessly cruel, deeply racist, utterly pointless move aimed at – what?! distracting the masses from the dumpster fire engulfing him? flexing his psychotic muscle by trying to find more people of color he can traumatize? – the Trump administration (sic) wants to deport certain Vietnamese refugees who may or may not have committed any crimes but they’re not quite white so really does it matter? [Read more…]
By American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
On the afternoon of December 10th, dozens of faith leaders were arrested in an act of nonviolent civil disobedience at the U.S.-Mexico border. More than 400 people of faith and supporters gathered in Border Field State Park in San Diego in support of migrants seeking refuge in the U.S. Faith leaders guided the group in a solemn procession to the border. When they reached the enforcement zone, they were stopped by a line of Border Patrol agents in riot gear. Leaders moved forward to offer a ceremonial blessing. Thirty people were taken into custody. [Read more…]
By Gabe Ortiz / Daily Kos
José Andrés’ latest humanitarian mission shows why he not only deserves his recent nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize, but also why he deserves to win it. The chef has taken his famed World Central Kitchen to the Mexican side of the southern border, where in the last few days he estimates he has fed as many as 3,000 refugees a day. He tells The Washington Post he’s there because he’s compelled to be there.
“’In the end, it’s very simple,” he said. “Our motto comes from John Steinbeck’s ‘The Grapes of Wrath.’ Wherever there’s a fight so hungry people may eat, I will be there.” The Washington Post reports that “then Andrés put his own amendment on Steinbeck’s famous line: ‘We will be there,’ he added.” Over 30 volunteers are there currently helping a smaller group of World Central Kitchen people. [Read more…]
By Todd Miller / YES! Magazine
Less than a mile south of the U.S.-Mexico border, in Sasabe, Mexico, a Guatemalan man named Giovanni (whose first name is used to protect his undocumented status) propped up his feet while an EMT applied antibiotic ointment to his feet in the shade of a cottonwood. Giovanni left his home country because of a catastrophic drought and was attempting to unite with his brothers who were already in Dallas.
After trying to cross the border into the Arizona desert, his feet were ravaged: discolored, covered in gashes and tender red blisters. One toenail had been ripped off. Across the arroyo, or dry wash, were about 30 more prospective border crossers, primarily Guatemalan, some awaiting a similar medical checkup, others stocking up on water and food.
It was July, and several days before in a 110-degree heat wave, he had crossed the border with a small group of about five other people from Guatemala. After 14 hours, they ran out of water. After 21 hours, Giovanni gave up and turned back alone. He had no water, no food, and quickly lost his orientation, but he made it back to Sasabe. [Read more…]
ACLU Deputy Director, Immigrants’ Rights Project, Lee Gelernt speaks with All In’s Chris Hayes about the process of seeking asylum in the U.S., and the current Administration’s attempt to subvert that process in violation of current U.S. and international law. One recent attempt on November 9th was for Trump to issue a proclamation declaring that only those entering the United States at designated ports of entry would be eligible to apply for asylum. It then submitted a rule to the federal register, letting it go into effect immediately and without the customary period for public comment. After a number of civil rights groups took the government to court, Lee Gelernt successfully argued against that case, with Judge Jon S. Tigar of the United States District Court in San Francisco in Monday issuing a temporary restraining order blocking the implementation of that rule. [Read more…]
By Edward Sifuentes / ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties
One night in late October, volunteers with the San Diego Rapid Response Network received the first of many reports of asylum-seeking migrant families being released on the streets of San Diego by immigration authorities.
Many of the families, which included women and small children, were disoriented, hungry and penniless. Most knew no one in our region. They were literally strangers in a strange land.
These new arrivals – primarily from Central America and from as far away as Africa – are being abandoned on our streets because the Trump administration discontinued the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) program that helps asylum-seekers to coordinate their travel to loved ones throughout the United States. ICE says it no longer has room to hold migrant families long enough to finalize travel arrangements.
Consequently, ICE is now releasing asylum-seeking families into our communities without food, transportation or shelter – and without coordinating or even communicating with local governments or nonprofit agencies who want to help them. [Read more…]
From the YouTube website:
In May, 1939, the SS St. Louis, a ship of Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution left Hamburg, bound for Havana, Cuba. Without their knowledge, their landing passes had been voided by the Cuban President, Laredo Bru. When the ship arrived in Cuba, the passengers were not allowed to debark. Representatives from the Jewish Joint Distribution committee negotiated with the Cuban government, but to no avail. The passengers appealed to President Roosevelt to allow them to land in the United States, but they were again turned away. The ship was forced to return to Europe, where two-thirds of the passengers would perish in the Holocaust.
Current U.S. and international asylum policies and laws owe much to the eventual repudiation of that sort of reaction to the plight of refugees. [Read more…]
As if ripping children from their parents’ arms, locking them up in cages or sending them to facilities on the other side of the country weren’t the absolute low point of the Trump administrations response to immigrants seeking asylum, we are now tear gassing children.
Let that sink in for a moment. We are tear gassing children, who were reported as running screaming and crying from the tear gas canisters shot into Mexico, a foreign country, by US Border Patrol. (Imagine this situation reversed, with Mexico lobbying canisters into the US.)
There is essentially no operative immigration policy in this country.
[Read more…]
KPBS’s Jean Guerrero was in Tijuana Sunday to report on the situation with the migrants that have been arriving from Central America. Here is some footage capturing the conditions around the municipal sports facility where the city is attempting to accommodate the arriving migrants. She also interviews a person who salvaged a spent tear gas canister from an earlier event where migrants approached the U.S. border. [Read more…]
What are the remedies to the cruel spectacle of a trumped up military presence on our southern border and the laws and policies which rip families apart and put children in cages? Unremitting political activism and moral rebukes are essential. And so is art. [Read more…]
It’s a Trumpian dream come true in TJ: mobs seeking to attack migrants as they arrive seeking asylum.
With passions inflamed by –at best– hyperbolic claims made on social media, anti-migrant protests led by various right wing groups have been taking place as elements of the caravan demonized by the U.S. President and his cohorts have been arriving in Tijuana.
One Facebook post claimed Hondurans tortured and killed a dog. Another claimed LGBTQ migrants were seeking molest children. [Read more…]
The other night I went to a Border Angels event, in celebration of their years of honoring their creed: “Love Has No Borders,” leaving water, among the things that they do, to keep people from dying trying to cross deserts where awaiting them is a sun that shows no mercy.
It was so nice just sitting there among people who believe deeply in the idea of rights for all human beings.
I was as kickbacked as I could be through all the welcomings and honoring dignitaries and congratulating people who give of themselves tirelessly towards the making of a better world – sipping on a margarita that was mixed just right, not too sour, not to sweet, smiling broadly, one moment, while a beautiful woman with a beautiful voice sang a beautiful song. What could go wrong? [Read more…]
