WHAT YOU CAN DO TO END FAMILY SEPARATION AND INCARCERATION
It will take all of us to stop this and build a better future. There are many ways to hone your message, take action, contact your elected officials, sign petitions, and contribute to the groups that are doing work on the ground who need our support.
Auburn has put together an ever-expanding list to offer opportunities for action to end family separations and to create a just and humane immigration policy. We will update as we receive more information. Please contact [email protected] with suggestions for this list.
Hone Your Message
Macky Alston offers five ways for faith leaders to speak effectively in this moment:
“You can’t, I believe, really compellingly reach everybody at the same time. You don’t have to do everything. If you can move just one group, that’s a win.”
Watch: Five Ways to Be Heard During This Crisis from Auburn Seminary on Vimeo (Captioned)
Marches, Civil Disobedience and Direct Action
Show up with your body and voice to one of the many rallies and civil disobedience opportunities happening around the country.
[UPDATED 6/29]Ongoing: Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not exist until 2002 and does not have to operate this way. If you are interested in direct action aimed at shutting down ICE permanently, join the #FreeOurFuture campaign. Mijente can connect you to opportunities near you. Learn more here.
June 30: Families Belong Together hosts actions in Washington, DC, and around the country. A march in DC will happen from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. in Lafayette Square and is sponsored by National Domestic Workers Alliance and United We Dream, MoveOn, ACLU, Women’s March, and others.
A sibling march in NYC begins at 10 a.m. at Foley Square and moves across the Brooklyn Bridge to Cadman Plaza. Sponsors include the NYCLU, Empire State Indivisible, and the Interfaith Center of New York. Search for your nearest march by state or zipcode.
Download messaging tips and use the hashtag #FamiliesBelongTogether on social media!
July 2: Head to San Diego for a direct action led by our partners at Mijente to #ShutDownSessions, #AbolishICE, and #FreeOurFuture. Buses are coming from Los Angeles, Orange County, Phoenix, Tucson, and the Bay! More information and RSVP info is available on Facebook.
Date TBD (expected July 1): Mothers march from El Paso to Tornillo, TX. Led by Paola Mendoza. Email [email protected] to join.
July 4: Participate in a mourn-in and day of fasting with Mama Ruby Sales and Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis in New York City in front of the Cayuga Center, a site of captivity for Brown and Black asylum-seeking and refugee children.
In New York, gather at the Cayuga Center from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Elsewhere, fast in solidarity from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Volunteers to serve as pallbearers, musicians, poets, outreach helpers, monitors, or guides are all welcome! Learn more about Caravans to the Borderlands and sign up for the July 4 Day of Action.
“Declare a day of independence in this reign of tyranny on this 4th of July from unholy and empty gestures, and join in a true praxis of liberty and justice for all.” —Ruby Sales, Caravans to the Borderlands
Previous Actions
June 21: Faith mission to the Ursula processing center in TX. Led by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. Email Jordyn Bussey at [email protected] to join the delegation of rabbis, ministers, bishops, and other faith leaders who will be ministering to children and holding a vigil outside of Ursula.
June 23: Families Belong Together March in San Diego, CA. Led by San Diego Indivisible.
June 24: #StopSeparation of Families at Tent City, Tornillo, TX. Tornillo, Texas, is the location of President Donald Trump’s first tent city constructed to house immigrant children separated from their parents, pursuant to his “zero tolerance” border plan. Led by VotoLatino.
June 27: Direct action at Tornillo Port of Entry from 11 a.m. MDT. A group of Latinx activists and organizers will attempt to deliver a message to the 300 children being detained in Tornillo as part of a rally protesting the separation of families and the criminalization of immigrants. RSVP on Facebook. Led by United We Dream and Mijente/#FreeOurFuture.
June 28: Families Belong Together Rally. At Brownsville Federal Court in TX, families, advocates, and allies will hold a rally in the park across the street from the Brownsville Federal Court, where immigrants are being prosecuted en masse for crossing the border into the United States, and then separated from their children. Led by the ACLU.
End Family Separation: Women Take Action, Washington, DC. On June 28, women will put their bodies on the line to demand safety and freedom for immigrant families and children and call for an end to this administration’s zero-tolerance policy of automatically criminalizing undocumented immigrants and tearing families apart. To join Women’s March and partner organizations, register. You’ll receive details about mandatory training, meeting time and location, and other critical information.
Speak Out In Your Community and To Your Elected Officials
Calling your representative in Congress is enormously important. Representatives need to hear that we are not going away and that we want comprehensive reform of our immigration system, not a compromise that involves building a wall.
You can easily find your representatives’ and senators’ numbers here.
Ecumenical Advocacy Days is encouraging all of us, especially people of faith, to reach out to politicians around the country as Congress begins to consider how to end this crisis. They ask faith leaders to write editorials, opinion pieces, blogs or other written media expressing outrage over family separation. Especially needed are written pieces from faith leaders in OK, AK, ND, LA, WA-4, VA-2 (Republicans) | MT, NH, WI, WV (Democrats) as Members of Congress discuss funding.
If you want some ideas of what you might say, EAD has created a sample script. Check out the link for more ideas about how to support asylees and other migrants in your local faith community.
Sign a Petition
Add your name to statements condemning this practice and connect with communities taking action.
Here are just a few:
- Bend The Arc: “We declare a moral emergency.”
- Boston Declaration: “All rights for all, without borders; todos los derechos para todas y todos, sin fronteras.”
- Church World Service: “Family detention is not a solution to family separation.”
- Faith in Public Life: “Keep families together.”
- Mijente: “Stop the move towards mass prosecutions.”
- National Domestic Workers Alliance: “Account for what is happening to all children in immigration custody.”
- The Women’s March: “End the violent practice of automatically criminalizing undocumented immigrants.”
Put Your Money Where Your Heart Is
Consider sponsoring these grassroots organizations that have been working on immigration and immigrant rights long before the most recent atrocities and that will continue working long after mainstream attention moves on.
Here is a list of great organizations who need your support:
- Services for those fighting detention cases: Puente, Juntos,RAICES, Mijente
- Legal organizations: Detention Watch Network, National Lawyers Guild
- Direct action organizing: Puente, Mijente
- Communications: NETA in Texas
- Advocacy: United We Dream, National Domestic Workers Alliance
Together we will end family separations, and we will end the injustice that continues to permeate our immigration system.
Again, please contact [email protected] with suggestions and updates for this list.
