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Mom Separated From Son: We’re ‘Trying To Save Our Lives’ | Video Worth Watching

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Supporters of the current administration’s policy of “zero tolerance” for the federal misdemeanor of illegal entry appear to believe that the vast majority of those seeking asylum are actually dangerous criminals intent on “infesting” the United States. Congressional representative Roger Marshall (R-KS), interviewed by Chris Hayes earlier today, referred to “people that are doing human trafficking, terrorists and cartel members using young kids” as the typical border crossers “posing as families”, even though when pressed by Chris Hayes for evidence, he could only say that the DHS reassured him that it is the truth.

For a more accurate understanding of a typical asylum seeker, watch this interview by MSNBC’s Trymaine Lee of an El Salvadoran mother who sought refuge with her husband and their two children, a four-year old and a fourteen-month old. When the husband presented himself for asylum with the fourteen-month old, the infant was taken from him without explanation and it took eighty-five days for the mother to be reunited with her infant. The father is still in custody.   [Read more…]

San Diego Protests Are Still On: Trump’s Immigration Action Just Makes Things Worse

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This article has three parts, a simple explanation of what’s coming up from the government, a listing of San Diego responses to Trump’s immigration policies over the next 10 days, and an analysis of what’s likely going to happen on the legal and political fronts in the coming days.

I cobbled these sections together from other people’s work to make the situation more understandable for our readers.

You need to know the only things changed today were the details. Your voice is needed more than ever to stop these abominations.   [Read more…]

‘Tender Age Facilities’ the Most Grotesque Orwellian Doublespeak of All

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Is there no limit to bureaucratic sadism?

“Where are the girls? Where are the babies and toddlers?” are the questions many of us have been asking all week.

We have learned that the GOP is our domestic Boko Haram, silent on the location of the girls and their treatment. And now we have learned that the babies, the children who have been ripped from their mothers’ arms are being placed in “Tender Age Facilities.” These are not shelters. These are prisons—for babies and toddlers who sit unattended in cages.

Over 2,300 children have been separated from their families since May. The GOP is a terrorist organization.   [Read more…]

Elijah Cummings Rips Republicans For Allowing Trump’s Child Internment Camps | Video Worth Watching

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During a joint hearing of the House Oversight Committee and the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, investigating the investigation into Hilary Clinton’s emails, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) in his opening remarks called out the unwillingness of the Republicans to exercise any oversight of the Trump administration, including the new policy of separating children from their […]

Student, Farmworker Visas to Be Targeted as Administration Looks to Double Down on Immigration

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Officials with the Trump administration have been quietly meeting for several months, according to an article in Politico, planning additional crackdowns on immigration prior to the mid-term elections.

While the details are still being worked out, proposals include tightening rules on student visas and exchange programs; limiting visas for temporary agricultural workers; creating obstacles making it harder for legal immigrants to obtain residency; and collecting biometric data from visitors from suspect countries.

The H-2A program for agricultural workers is uncapped, meaning there’s no annual limit on visas. Limiting the number of visas flies in the face of immigration bills proposed by Congressional Republicans, which typically try to make it easier for farmers to bring in guest workers.   [Read more…]

Listen to Children Who’ve Just Been Separated From Their Parents at the Border | Video Worth Watching

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Yes, folks, this is still happening. Prepare to have your heart ripped out. ProPublica received an audio recording of children from inside a U.S. Customs and Border Protection facility. According to ProPubilca:

The person who made the recording asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation. That person gave the audio to Jennifer Harbury, a well-known civil rights attorney who has lived and worked for four decades in the Rio Grande Valley along the Texas border with Mexico. Harbury provided it to ProPublica. She said the person who recorded it was a client who “heard the children’s weeping and crying, and was devastated by it.”

The person estimated that the children on the recording are between 4 and 10 years old. It appeared that they had been at the detention center for less than 24 hours, so their distress at having been separated from their parents was still raw. Consulate officials tried to comfort them with snacks and toys. But the children were inconsolable.

The Washington Examiner notes that HHS reports holding around 11,500 children at the moment, but at the current rate of prosecutions and separations, that figure will climb to around 30,000 by August.   [Read more…]

Trump’s Cruel Immigration Policies Provoke Protests on the Left, Misinformation on the Right

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The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” – George Orwell, “1984”

On Fox and Friends this morning, host Steve Doocy told America what the Dear Leader wanted them to hear: No, these aren’t cages, the authorities simply “built walls out of chain-link fences.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen’s Sunday tweets denying the obvious– “We do not have a policy of separating families at the border. Period” –hasn’t worked.

Over the past few days, the American public has been told the practice of separating families is an “effective deterrent, biblically compliant and/or the Democrats’ fault,” depending on who was talking.

(Local Protests listed inside…)   [Read more…]

Immigrant Rights Advocates Mark Father’s Day with Vigils & Visits at Detention Centers

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By Jessica Corbett / Common Dreams

As families across the United States celebrated Father’s Day on Sunday, immigrants and advocates held a vigil at the Ursula Border Patrol Processing Center in South McAllen, Texas to express support for children who were torn from their asylum-seeking parents at the Southern border and are now being held in the facility.

In the just six weeks since President Donald Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions imposed a “cruel” so-called zero-tolerance policy that enables federal immigration agents to separate families at the border—to prosecute the parents and detain the children—Department of Homeland Security (DHS) records recently obtained by journalists show that nearly 2,000 children have been taken into custody.

“We are witnessing a whole new level of attack on migrant families,” said People’s Action director George Goehl, who attended the vigil in Texas.   [Read more…]

Rep. Beto O´Rourke Prepares to Visit the First ‘Tent Facility’ for the Overflow of Unaccompanied Minors | Video Worth Watching

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Yes folks, this is still happening. CNN‘s Jake Tapper speaks with Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), the Democratic congressman as he prepares to visit the first 360 children at the Tornillo, Texas tent facility set up to accommodate the massive increase in the number of unaccompanied immigrant children, an increase created by the Trump administration’s new policy of “zero tolerance”. He points out that the process of separating families is “inhumane” and it’s up to everyone – Republicans and Democrats – to stop this practice.   [Read more…]

The Old Fascist

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Not unlike the maddened men of German infamy
Sending millions to death chambers of Zyclon B
Our own Mad King reaches out with fattened arms
And declares all the desperate invading swarms.
Here at our sun-washed and hurricaned shores
Stands Lady Liberty with mighty torch unflamed
Mother of Exiles until the Mad King came,
To extinguish the lightning of her eternal flame.   [Read more…]

‘We Have No Idea When Or If Mother And Child Will Be Reunited’ | One of the Detention Facilities is Here in El Cajon | More Video Worth Watching

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All In’s Chris Hayes speaks with Rep. Beta O’Rourke (D-TX) who visited several immigration facilities in McAllen, Texas this week and tells Chris Hayes what he saw.

Also, one of the detention facilities for the children is here in El Cajon. Chris Hayes speaks with MSNBC’s Gadi Schwartz reporting from outside the facility.
  [Read more…]

Who Needs the Constitution? The Bible Tells Them So | Progressive Activist Calendar June 15-25, 2018

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“The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. An evil soul producing holy witness Is like a villain with a smiling cheek, A goodly apple rotten at the heart. O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!” – The Merchant of Venice, Act I, Scene 3

The last time I checked, the ultimate authority on the law in the United States is the Constitution. In their quest for rationalizing cruel and unusual treatment of migrants, Trump’s officials have decided to bypass this document, claiming the moral high ground by using biblical verses.

There is a larger point besides the inappropriateness and sordid history of this particular verse, namely that the Attorney General has chosen to make a theocratic argument. I said it before, and I’ll say it again, creating a theocratic state is the ultimate goal of a majority of conservative Republicans in government.

  [Read more…]

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