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THE ISSUE:
As hundreds of thousands of Americans are protesting the policing of daily life, especially among Black communities and communities of color, immigration policy is moving in a notably dangerous direction. The system criminalizes, incarcerates and deports people — separating families and loved ones forever, and depriving them of their liberty.
Fairness, freedom, opportunity, and respect for human rights should be at the core of our immigration system. But it isn’t set up to uphold these values. Racism is the root of many of our systems in the United States. Designed to strip people of their dignity, the U.S. immigration system racially profiles and targets people based on the color of their skin.
Detention is one aspect of a set of inhumane immigration policies including deportation and the ignoring of laws relating to asylum and due process. The federal government wastes more than $25 billion each year on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to profile, detain and deport immigrants. The mechanisms built to target, detain and deport immigrants are rooted in collaboration with militarized police forces.
ICE detention is the practice of incarcerating people who are immigrants—from those who have just arrived to those who’ve lived in the U.S. for years— while they await a determination of their immigration status or potential deportation. Detention is an integral part of the machinery of deportation.
Here are the relevant facts: In 2019, ICE detained, on average, over 50,000 people each day. As of January 2020, 81 percent of people detained in ICE custody nationwide are held in facilities owned or managed by private prison corporations — a record high. Various reports detail horrifying conditions inside detention facilities: 300 people are being held in cells designed for 150 people with no room to lie down to sleep; people being told to drink out of toilets; many are without access to showers for periods sometimes exceeding 20 days. On October 24th, 2019, ACLU reported that more than 5,400 children have been separated from their families at the Mexico border since July 2017. Adults and children have been suffering and dying in taxpayer funded facilities. Since 2003 there have been over 207 deaths in ICE detention, and this does not include children.
On top of these brutal actualities, there are confirmed cases of COVID-19 within these facilities. Prompt action to release individuals from ICE detention is not only the just and moral course, but the most reasonable health intervention to prevent unnecessary deaths.
In Plain Sight is entering the movement by engaging people in the U.S. to use their social and monetary capital to support organizations working to end inhumane detention. We are highlighting the human costs of militarization and privatization of U.S immigration policy. Using the power of art, activism, and civic engagement, we are bringing together people from these different worlds and different disciplines to act on our moral imperative for justice and equality for immigrants.
SOLIDARITY STATEMENT
The liberation of immigrant and migrant communities and Black communities are deeply bound together. The violence our communities suffer is rooted in white supremacy and colonization. We stand in solidarity with the Movement for Black Lives and their ongoing work for a just and free world.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
1) Donate to Detention Bond Funds
Detained immigrants sometimes have the opportunity to be released on cash bond - which is like bail - while fighting for immigration cases. Bonds range from $1,500 to $250,000, and many families can't afford these amounts to free their family members -- who might have been arrested in ICE raids, or have been in the US for decades, or who are mothers separated from their children at the border, among many other types of people detained. Without the ability to pay a bond, longtime lawful permanent residents, asylum seekers and undocumented immigrants who may be eligible for relief from deportation are forced to languish in immigration detention. This is one way you can help: Please donate to free immigrants from jail while we work towards a human solution that allows families to stay together and lets individuals focus their efforts on winning their immigration cases. Below is a listing of national and local bonds named by our organizational partners.
#MeltICE Freedom Fund: your contribution to the 2020 Freedom Fund at the Community Justice Exchange will be distributed across the 36 immigration bond funds of the National Bail Fund Network to help post bond for individuals in immigration detention. Support your local fund directly by finding them in this national directory of 36 local community-run bond funds.
Black Immigrants Bail Fund provides free assistance and relief to black immigrants in pursuit of Liberation and Justice.
Bay Area Immigrant Bond: All donations to the Bay Area Immigration Bond Fund are tax-deductible and will be recycled in the future to help win the freedom of other people from immigration detention.
First Friends' Bond Fund supports people detained in New Jersey's four Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers.
Free Our Neighbors uses donor funds to pay immigration bonds for people held in immigration jail who currently lack the means to pay the bond themselves. We are a completely volunteer-run organization. We are dedicated to using donations to pay immigration bonds as directly as possible.
Immigrant Liberation Fund supports immigrants detained in Adelanto whom have been granted bond, but are still detained because they can't afford to pay it (each bond ranges from $1500-$10,000+). Getting out of detention may well save their lives. Fight back by donating all or part of yours to free someone at high risk for COVID-19 from detention.
Inland Coalition 4 Immigrant Justice commissary fund provides resources for people currently detained.
2) Sponsorship
Sponsorship is a precondition for folks’ bond to be set. There is currently an extremely high demand for sponsors to offer refuge so folks may be released. You can learn more about this via the link below. Freedom for Immigrants is working with the Asylum Seeker Sponsorship Project and other collectives across territories to recruit more sponsors for this decarceration effort.
Freedom for Immigrants Sponsor- Freedom - pledge to welcome immigrants in your community as a sponsor.
3) Join the Movement
In response to the growing public health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the United States government’s inadequate response, thousands of advocates have been sounding the alarm since March that all people in immigration detention must be released from detention immediately. ICE’s detention system is notorious for its fatally flawed medical care and abysmal conditions that only worsen in times of crisis. The government can and should release all people from detention immediately. All levels of government actors have a role to demand Free Them All.
This moment highlights why cages are a public health nuisance, people can’t heal, recuperate, or avoid infection in jails and prisons.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement exists to target, imprison, and deport immigrants. Locking up and exiling people are their only reason for being. Immigration enforcement officers are now the largest federal police force. Their budget is more than that of all other federal law enforcement agencies combined. They are accountable to no one, and take their marching orders directly from Trump. We need to defund ICE, and we need legislation that dismantles the agency. They have only been around for 15 years, and their continued existence is far from inevitable. There’s already movement: at least 21 Democratic congressional primary candidates have come out in favor of abolishing the agency. Trump’s deportation squad should cease to exist. Immigration enforcement as we know it must end.
4) Vote
For those eligible to vote in the US, it’s crucial to use your voice in this year’s election. Visit vote.org to find out how to register, and get your friends, family, and community to the polls. Elect public officials who are accountable and hold up the values of human rights and fairness in our immigration system.
OUR ORGANIZATIONAL PARTNERS
- La Resistencia
- Mayavision
- Haitian Bridge Alliance
- CALIFORNIA IMMIGRANT YOUTH JUSTICE ALLIANCE
- GEORGIA LATINO ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
- El Rescate
- Central American Research and Policy Institute
- Clinica Romero
- Salvadoran American Leadership and Educational Fund
- CARECEN-LA
- Make the Road New Jersey
- Make the Road New York
- Familia TQLM
- Mijente
- National Day Laborer Organizing Network
- Detention Watch Network
- ACLU Southern California
- Freedom for Immigrants
- Raices
- Immigrant Legal Resource Center
- Center for Cultural Power
- Tsuru for Solidarity
- Estamos Unidos
- Inland Coalition 4 Immigrant Justice
- Puente Human Rights Movement
- CEDIMAC
- Mexicanos en Exilio
- The Tornillo Collective
- Solidarity for Sanctuary
- Translatin@ Coalition
OUR SUPPORTERS
- Agnes Gund
- The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
- For Freedoms
- Good Works Foundation and Laura Donnelley
- The Hillenburg family
- InColor_
- Krupp Family Foundation
- Map Fund
- MOCA
- OUTsider Fest
- Oxy Arts
- Quiet
- Taskforce
- Wilhelm Family Foundation
- Wanda Kownacki
- Canada Council for the Arts
- Canada Council for the Arts